The Life Of Sir William Howard Russell Vol I

SIR WILLIAM HOWARD
RUSSELL

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

THE WAR IN CUBA

THE RELIEF OF LADY-
SMITH

NATIONAL PHYSICAL
TRAINING

SIDE SHOWS

THE LIFE OF

SIR WILLIAM HOWARD
RUSSELL

C.V.O., LL.D.

THE FIRST SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

By JOHN BLACK ATKINS

WITH PORTRAITS AND ILLUSTRATIONS

?;voLUMr I

LONDON

JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET

BRADBORY, AGHEf, & CO. LD., ‘PRINTERS,
LONDON AND TONBRIDGE.

PREFACE

It is counted as a prime merit in Montesquieu that
he separated biography from history. It would be an
easy thing, but also certainly a mistake, to say that to
write the history of William Howard Russell is to
write the history of the Crimean War, the Mutiny, the
American Civil War, the Austro-Prussian War, and
the Franco-German War. I have preferred to follow,
at a respectful distance, the example of Montesquieu ;
the background of those wars has been sketched, and
the policy which led to them and the episodes in the
fighting have been examined or described, in exact
accordance with what seemed to be their relevance to
Russell’s career.

This way of writing a biography implies a strict
obligation. Since the man himself is the object of
attention, the writer is bound to try to present a real
picture of him. Yet it should be a picture that will
neither be a figure of sawdust nor gratify a debased
curiosity. To this obligation I have tried to be faithful.
Russell’s achievements were inseparable from Russell’s
character ; his reasons for regarding men’s actions in
this way or that are discoverable only through a
knowledge of what manner of man he was himself in
his family affections, his friendships, his impetuosity,
his fine power of compassion, and in those qualities
which caused him to be reckoned as matchless “good
company.”

VI

PREFACE

I am conscious that in one respect Nemesis has over-
taken me. In criticising the biographies of others 1
have often thought it right to join the chorus which
condemns long biographies. There have been (as I
still think) few men whose lives could not have justice
done to them in one volume, and in most cases one
volume is the sole instrument of justice. Yet here 1
have written two volumes. I approached my task with
no thought of doing more than choosing the charac-
teristic facts of Russell’s life which would sufficiently
suggest all that was left unsaid. But I had not
reckoned on a discovery which entirely overbore all
my prepossessions. I found that he had preserved a
virtually complete series of letters which present all
the relations of a special correspondent with his
employers — editor, manager and proprietors. My du ty
then seemed to me clear, and became clearer as, during
some two years, I read my way deeper into the mass
of materials. The “ special correspondent ” is a pecu-
liar child of our modern civilisation who has an
extraordinary, almost an unrivalled, power; no one
can deny that fact, whether he thinks that the power is
exercised for evil or for good. When I not only
recognised that I had before me the full apparatus,
which had never before been available, for writing the
life of a “special correspondent,” but remembered that
the life was that of the first special correspondent —
the auctor et fundator of all the duties which special
correspondents have since undertaken— I could no
longer be in doubt as to what I ought to do. The
whole story, I told myself, must be put on record.

It would be affectation in me to pretend that I do not
think that this biography conveys a very important
lesson (I refer only to its facts, not to my share in its

PREFACE

vii

production). I would beg my countrymen seriously
to consider what this lesson is ; to ask themselves what
issue is laid before them, and to come to a conclusion
on the evidence. It is often said that the day of the
war correspondent is over and that in future British
wars the example of the Japanese, in effectually
muzzling the correspondents, will be followed. The
analogy is a dangerous one. Autres peuples, autres
moeurs. Unless we are prepared to change all our
habits of thought — our national conviction that a know-
ledge of facts is the sole basis of judgment — there can
be no trustworthy argument from the experience of
other nations. In the last chapter of this book I have
explained what I mean, but here I would only request
the reader to put to himself the very simple question
whether Russell, as a war correspondent, did more
good than he did harm. I believe that there can be
only one answer. Russell “ saved the remnant ” of the
British Army in the Crimea ; his first letter from Cawn-
pore in the Mutiny secured the suppression of the
policy of indiscriminate executions ; in the American
Civil War he helped Englishmen to change their minds
and to see that the Federal cause was the cause of
justice and truth ; in the Austro-Prussian War, though
he was “ only a civilian,” he implored the War Office
to adopt the “ needle-gun ’’ before it was too late ; and
for several years he insisted, in the face of much
expert obscurantism, that a mistake had been made in
1863 in reverting to muzzle-loading artillery. These
curiously varied services to his country are at least
comparable with any which can be rendered by a
soldier.

If this record assumed that Russell never made a
mistake it would defeat its purpose. Even if one takes

Vlll

PREFACE

the view that in the Crimea he unjustly criticised Lord
Raglan, the proposition remains unrefuted that the
positive value of his presence in the field enormously
outweighed its disadvantages, I have not attempted
to make myself responsible for all his opinions. What
I have attempted is something vastly more important
than a demonstration of intellectual infallibility — the
proof that Russell was an honourable, courageous,
and patriotic man. It required no prodigies of pene-
tration to perceive that the Army in the Crimea was
being muddled into its grave, but it did require a
man of high independence and noble pity to make the
facts known to his countrymen. Sir James Outram
wrote to Russell on receiving a letter from him:
“I shall treasure it not because it is the flattering
and warmly-written letter of a man of European fame,
but because it is the letter of an honest truth-telling
man.” Russell’s triumphs were triumphs of character
even more than of vivacity or style. Dr. Johnson
said that no man was ever written down except by
himself Russell’s best certificates of motive are his
writings. It is unnecessary to claim for him more
than he claimed for himself He once said to a friend,

“ I may have often been deceived but I never inten-
tionally wronged any man.”

A word should be said as to the spelling of Indian
names. I have adopted the Hunterian method, as it
seemed advisable to fall in with that method which
enjoys the greatest weight of authority. And yet I
could not bring myself to modernise the spelling of
letters written during the Mutiny, for the old-fashioned
names carry the very atmosphere of those tragic and
heroic days. India, one thinks, would hardly have
been India to Lord Clyde if he had spelt Oodeypore

PREFACE

IX

Udaipur. I have adopted this double plan, which has,
I know, all the superficial appearance of inconsistency,
on the advice of an Indian scholar. Even so, I have
allowed myself the deliberate minor inconsistency of
spelling very well known names in the old way, for
which my excuse is that anything is preferable to
pedantry. I do not expect that my solution of a
familiar difficulty will satisfy many critics, but I am
informed that there is no known solution which will
satisfy all.

Finally, I have to thank those who have helped me
with reminiscences or by giving their consent to the
publication of letters. As they are too numerous to be
named I must content myself with a general but grate-
ful acknowledgment. I cannot forbear, however, to
mention Lady Russell, Mrs. Thornhill (Russell’s elder
daughter), Mrs. Longfield (Russell’s younger daughter).
Lord Cromer, Lord Wolseley, Sir Evelyn Wood, Sir
Charles Dilke, General A. E. Codrington, Colonel H.
W. Pearse, Mr. C. F. Moberly Bell, Mr. A, I. Dasent
(the author of “The Life of J. T. Delane”), Miss
Hogarth (who gave me permission to use the letters
from Charles Dickens), Commander C. N. Robinson,
Mr. John Leyland, Mr. G. F. Bacon (the manager of
the Army and Navy Gazette), Mr. John Sherer, Mr.
St. Loe Strachey, Mr. C. L Graves, Mr. John Baker,
Mr. Alfred Everson, and Miss Alice Boazman, who
has acted with much zeal and intelligence as my
Secretary.

J. B. A.

Moverons Manor,

BRtGHTLINGSEA,

October xyth, 1910 .

CONTENTS TO VOLUME I

CHAPTER I.

BOYHOOD.

Russell’s Birth —His Family— His Father leaves Ireland — His
Grandfather Kelly— Life in Dublin— Mrs. Hemans— Russell
goes to School i— n

CHAPTER II.

COLLEGE AND JOURNALISM.

The Crested Lark— A Tutorship— Trinity College, Dublin— Report-
ing the Elections of 1841 for the Times . . ^. 12—23

CHAPTER III.

THE REPEAL AGITATION IN IRELAND.

Russell goes to London— Kensington Grammar School— Parliamen-
tary Reporting for the Tims — The Repeal Agitation in
Ireland — The “ Monster Meetings ’’ — O’Connell and his
Tenants 23—35

CHAPTER IV.

THE TRIAL OF o’CONNELL.

The Clontarf Meeting— O’Connell’s Trial— Russell’s hasty Journey
to London with the Verdict— A Cunning Trick— O’Connell’s
way— Verdi’s “ Ernani ” 36“46

CHAPTER V.

THE RAILWAY MANIA.

Russell Engaged to be Married— Lord Campbell— The Railway
Mania— Work of the Railway Committees— George Hudson—
A Railway Accident— Russell joins the Morning Chronicle—
Founding of the Daily News . ... 47—59

xii CONTENTS TO VOLUME I

CHAPTER VI.

WORKING FOR THE MOHNING af/iO^'^CLU.

Russell’s Marriage— The Potato Famine— A Ghost Story— The
Burgoyne Letter— Russell dismissed from (he Moriiinf' Chronick
— “ At a loose end ’’—Birth of Russell’s First Child fi>. 60-73

CHAPTER VII.

BACK TO THE TmiiS.

Russell rejoins the State Trials in Ireland— Smith O^Briou—

Rush the Murderer— Russell called to the Bar— Disrislroits First
Brief 74^-«4

CHAPTER VIIL

THE DANISH WAR OF 185O.

The Danish War of 1850— War Correspondents — General Willison
— Battle of Idstedt 85 t).|,

CHAPTER IX.

EXPERIENCES OF A DESCRIPTIVE REPORTER.

French Naval Review — The Sunday of thti

Dublin Daily Express — Kossuth. . . . /V'* 95'^ it-M

CHAPTER X.

THE FIELDING AND THE GARRICK.

The Fielding and Garrick Clubs — Charles Read© — Douglas Jerrold
— Archdeckne and Thackeray — Albert Smith—** Winkle ’’ Sports-
men — The Duke of Wellington and the Birkenhead 105— x 14

CHAPTER XL

MORE EXPERIENCES OF A REPORTER.

Delane— An elaborate Practical Joke— Rob Roy MacGregor— The
Duke of Wellington’s Funeral— A Dinner of Lunatics— Piety
and Prize^ghting - 115—123

CONTENTS TO VOLUME I

xiii

CHAPTER XII.

THE CRIMEAN WAR: PRELIMINARIES,

Preliminaries of Crimean War — Russell goes to Malta — On to the
Dardanelles — At Gallipoli — Beginning of Chaos — Scutari —
Scotsman vorsiis Greek — Russell’s Style . . 124—138

CHAPTER XIIL

AT VARNA.

At Varna — A Critical Decision — “Bono Johnny 1 ’’—The Solitary
Tent at Aladyn — Sir George Brown— The Correspondents of
the Timos — The Voyage to the Crimea . . 139— 151

CHAPTER XIV.

AT THE BATTLE OF THE ALMA.

The Landing on the Beach — The March to the Alma — How to
see a Battle? — The Fog of War — Writing under Difficulties

pp . 152—163

CHAPTER XV.

AT BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN.

Sir John Burgoyne — Charge of the Light Brigade— The “Thin Red
Line ” — Lord Cardigan — Colonel Eber — Inkerman — Sir Henry
Layard — Sir De Lacy Evans — “ Treachery ” — Correspon-
dents pp* 164—176

CHAPTER XVI.

THE AWFUL PLATEAU.

Mr. John Walter— The Gale— A Classical Pun— Russell turned out
of his House— Lord Raglan's Correspondence— Lord Raglan’s
Visits to the Camps ; Assertions and Denials — Sufferings of the
Army — The Truth too Terrible — The Want of Roads

pp, 177—189

CHAPTER XVIL

THE RESPONSE TO RUSSELL’s LETTERS.

Lord Strathnairn— Russell’s Information to the Enemy — A “ Camp
Follower” — Scenes of Misery — Effect of Russell’s Letters — ^The
Stream of “ Comforts ” PP^ 190— 199

XIV

CONTENTS TO VOLUME I

CHAPTER XVIII.

THE SPRING OF 1855.

Russell’s Hut— “Disagreeables”— Alexis Soyer— The Kertch Expedi-
tion — Encounter with Sir George Brown — Mrs. Russell — Re-
publication o£ RusselPs Letters .... pp , 200 — 213

CHAPTER XIX.

WAS RUSSELL UNJUST TO LORD RAGLAN ?

The Assault of June 18, 1855— Was Russell unjust to Lord Raglan? —
Controversy with Lord Dartmouth — Sir John McNeill’s Tribute
to Lord Raglan — Russell’s Powerful Enemies — Sir John Adye —
Kinglake pp. 214 — 229

CHAPTER XX.

THE REDAN AND AFTER.

The Fielding Club— A Holiday — Contract with a Servant— The
Redan— Russell’s Praise of Windham — Codrington’s Plan of
Attack— Codrington’s Letter to Russell— Colin Campbell — Inside
Sebastopol — Expedition to Odessa . . . pp, 230—244

CHAPTER XXL

RUSSELL’S ACHIEVEMENT.

Russell in England— Return to the Crimea— Angry Words with
Windham— Russell the Soldier’s Friend— His Love of the Army
—His Letters a Corrective to the French View of the Criinoan
War— Kinglake on Russell— Sir Evelyn Wood— Sir Robert

pp - 245^5559

CHAPTER XXIL

RUSSELL AS LECTURER.

Lord Palmerston Coronation at Moscow — Russell as Lecturer-
Stage Fright Dickens Death of Douglas Jerrold — Dickens
and Jerrold— Russell goes to India . . • pp , 260—274

CONTENTS TO VOLUME I

XV

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE mutiny: first impressions.

Russell’s Mission in India — Heroes of the Mutiny — Russell’s Sym-
pathy with Native Races — Military Reputations — Lord Canning
— Lord Mark Kerr — Colin Campbell — The Nana’s Lieu-
tenant pp. 375—290

CHAPTER XXIV.

BEFORE LUCKNOW.

Colin Campbell’s Confidence in Russell — Mr. John Sherer — Calcutta
and Clemency — Russell’s Powers of Observation — Kavanagh—
At the Dilkusha — Sir James Outram — Sack of the Kaisar-
Bagh — Canning’s Proclamation .... pp. 291 — 308

CHAPTER XXV.

THE ROHILKHAND CAMPAIGN.

Letter from Outram — Success of Russell’s Letters — A Bad Kick —
Sufferings in a Dooly — Charge of Sowars— Russell at Death’s
Door — Chivalrous Ideals — Did Russell Traduce his Country-
men? pp. 309—325

CHAPTER XXVI.

IN THE HILLS.

The King of Delhi — Lord William Hay— W. D. Arnold — Letter
from Outram — Dickens on the Thackeray-Yates Quarrel —
Kavanagh pp, 326—341

CHAPTER XXVII.

THE queen’s proclamation.

Visit to the Rajah of Patiala — Lord Clyde Explains his Coming
Campaign — Outram’s Misgivings — The Queen’s Proclama-
tion pp, 342—352

CHAPTER XXVIII.

LETTERS TO DELANE.

Opening of the Oudh Campaign— A Specimen Day — ^The Final Work
at Lucknow — Letters to Delane — English Faults — Russell leaves
India pp-

XVI

CONTENTS TO VOITJME I

CHAPTER XXIX.

leader-writing.

Quarantine at Marseilles-The Emperor’s Ericml -Release from

i"/- itio— 378

CHAPTER XXX.

THE ./AM/r ^AVJ> AVl^K OA/iHTTB,

''““sf ‘'"f ■‘‘“"'“"'■"I -

oir jjc L.acy iivans— Finance — A ” rmin u 1

Russell goes to the United States ^ ' « Dchum -

• I'fi- 879— jyo

APPENDIX.

The “ Thin Red Line ’

/A 391-393

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

LORD RAGLAN, GENERAL p^:LISSIER AND OMAR PASHA Frontispiece

FACINQ

PAOB

“ BONO JOHNNY I ” I4I

ON, BRAVE HORSE II I4I

LANDING OF OUR OWN T/MSS CORRESPONDENT AND DESTRUC-
TION OF THE OTHER CORRESPONDENTS . . . .153

RETURNING FROM PICKET 153

ANGELO AND VIRGILIO 164

DR. RUSSELL; OR THE TROUBLES OF A WAR CORRESPONDENT. I64

ENTHUSIASM OF PATERFAMILIAS ON READING THE REPORT IN

THE Tims OF THE GRAND CHARGE OP BRITISH CAVALRY . 259

REPRODUCTION OF A LETTER FROM NANA SAHIB . , .388

SICK AND WOUNDED IN DOOLIES— THE ENEMY IN SIGHT . . 316

GOOD NEWS IN DISPATCHES— GENERAL MANSFIELD AND LORD

CLYDE 363

R.— VOL. I.

b

THE LIFE OF
SIR WILLIAM HOWARD
RUSSELL

CHAPTER I

BOYHOOD

On his sixty-fifth birthday William Howard Russell
began his autobiography. “ It is rather late," he
wrote, “ to begin an account of my life, but as I fain
would make it an autobiography for which I alone am
responsible there is not a day to be lost.” Two years
later he had to record that many days had been lost ;
few indeed had been saved. “Diem perdidi!” he
exclaims often, with Titus, in his diary — “ Diem
perdidi ! quot dies perdidi, miser ! ” With a belief in
favourable omens which was characteristic of him, he
began his autobiography afresh on his sixty-seventh
birthday ; but though he lived to be almost eighty-six
years of age, the autobiography remains to us only
in disconnected fragments. Yet he talked of it often
to his friends. We find Sir Archibald Alison, who
had known him in the Crimean War and the Mutiny,
and had been his friend ever since, writing : “ I am
very happy to hear that you are at work on your
memoirs. I am sure it will be one of the most varied
and interesting works ever written."

It is a familiar and likeable trait of old age that
the fancy revolves round the memories of extreme
youth, and if Russell had written of his crowded life

R,— VOL. 1. B

2

BOYHOOD

[Chap. I.

as amply as he reproduced reminiscences of his child-
hood, he would have obscured such particular triumphs
of his career as his courageous and independent evi-
dence in the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny.
Nevertheless it is the duty — in this case the pleasure
also — of the biographer to be bound by the wishes of
his subject. It shall be the aim of this record to
borrow Russell’s words from his autobiographical
fragments and diaries whenever that is reasonably
possible; and, further, by the choice of material to
reflect the temper in which it is judged that he would
have written the book himself.

“I was born at Jobestown — otherwise Lily Vale — "
he writes, “ in the parish of Tallaght, in the county
of Dublin, on March 28, 1820. There my mother's
father, Captain John, or, as he was generally called,
Jack, Kelly, had a small property and a big, untidy
house, where he held revels as master of the Tallaght
Pack-;-' the finest in Ireland or the wo-r-r-r-ld.’ Not
far distant on higher ground were the walls of an
ancient mansion, dignified by the title of Castle Kelly,
which had been in the family for ages. If ever the
Kellys — ^who dropped their ' O ’ in 1690 — had been as
high up the hill as the ruins were, they were going
down very rapidly— indeed, they were very nearly at
the bottom of it at the time of my birth.”

Russell’s father, John Russell, was then about
twenty-four, “ a large-limbed, solid, joyous man," in
some way agent for a great Sheffield firm — Water-
house and Company— and deep in speculations which
were not successful. Russell’s mother was only seven-
teen, and he has recorded, what he had often been
told, that his father used to walk out to Lily Vale
from Dublin to see and court her and then back to
Dublin, “some twenty miles." John Russell came of a
family which had been long settled in County Limerick,

THE RUSSELL FAMILY

3

1820]

but it is unnecessary to trace the descent more than
a few steps. William Howard Russell’s great-great-
grandfather, George Russell, married Jane Poe, the
daughter of a captain in the navy. Their son John
married Mary, daughter of the Rev. Abraham Downes.
A son of this marriage, named William, married Anne,
daughter of Captain Noble Johnson, of Cork, and it
was their son John who became the father of the
subject of this biography.

“ I was named William after my paternal grandfather,”
says the autobiography, “ Howard after a clergyman in
the county of Wicklowj and Nicholas after Nicholas
Roe, a distiller in Dublin. There was no renewal of
‘ Nicholas ’ at my confirmation. My aunt Stanistreet
left me a sum of money in her will, but it could never
be found anywhere else. It had been arranged that the
sons of my parents’ marriage should be brought up in
their father’s faith and that the daughters should be
Roman Catholics, but that was viewed with disfavour
by the grandparents on both sides, and over my
unconscious body waged an acrimonious controversy.”

In those days mixed marriages were fairly common
in Ireland. But when shortly after the birth of
William Howard Russell misfortune broke up his
father’s business the catastrophe was hailed as a “judg-
ment” by both parties to the dispute. The boy’s
father and mother took their courage in both hands
and left Ireland in the conviction— perhaps even more
common in Irishmen than in Englishmen — that a novel
and harder way of life is much easier in another
country. They settled in Liverpool, and John Russell
started a small business which was by no means
profitable — a result which dismally failed to corre-
spond to the fine air of resolution with which we
may suppose the ruined man to have left Ireland.
He does not appear to have had the faculty of success,

4

BOYHOOD

[Chap. I.

because his tastes were meditative and academic much
more than commercial; and later we hear of him
accepting appointments unsuited alike to his abilities
and— as one might say, did he appear to have been
susceptible to such a consideration — to his position.
It is not unfair, indeed, to assume that besides finding
his new method of life distasteful he suffered, when
it came to the point, from a certain infirmity of
purpose. On this supposition alone can one account
for the strange arrangement by which the young
William was transferred to the care of his grandfather
Kelly. Accounts of John Russell which remain
describe him as a cultivated and courteous gentleman.
Adversity never abated his geniality or permitted
him to cease to care for his appearance, which, if one
mayjudge from the clearness with which it is recalled,
was aided by a natural distinction. The tombstone
which he erected to his wife and second son may be
found in St. J ames’s Cemetery, Liverpool. The inscrip-
tion attests his classical inclinations, and these were
inherited by his sons. The inscription runs: —

“In Memoriam
Mariae

Joharmis Russell uxoris dilectissimao
Filiae Pref. Jobs. Kelly,
de Lily Vale in Com Dublin
obiit Maii xxx 1840, Aetat 36.

Atque Jobs. Howard,

Filii sec. Johannis et Mariae Russell
Div; Job: Evang. Coll Cantab, alumni
Apud Clanghton, Maii xxlv, 1847
Obiit Aetat 24,

We pass to the life of William Russell in the house
of his mother^s relations.

“ One of xny earliest recollections/' continues the
autobiography, “is that of my grandfather, Captain

1820 - 28 ] CAPTAIN JACK KELLY

5

Jack Kelly, a tall slight man, his powdered hair
gathered up in a queue and tied with a black ribbon,
his chin nestling in the folds of a deep, white neckcloth.
He was usually dressed in a blue coat with brass
buttons, a fawn-coloured waistcoat with many pockets,
buckskin breeches not spotless, with a set of keys and
seals hanging from his pockets, and boots with tan
tops. On hunting days he attired himself in a square-
cut scarlet coat with large cuffs and pockets and brass
buttons, and in lieu of his fluffy beaver, turned up
behind, he donned a velvet skull cap with peak and
tassel. What he was Captain of I know not, but there
was in the ‘ parlour ’ a picture of a lad in a red coat
with wide lappets of dark blue turned back so as to
show shirt-frul, stock, and white waistcoat, small silver
epaulettes and kerseymere breeches, which I was told
— and resolutely declined to believe — was the living
image of my grandfather the year he married his first
wife. Another warrior whose likeness hung on the
wall was Major F elix Kelly, who was ‘ killed in the Low
Countries.’ There was an interesting picture of another
member of the family who was not often mentioned, as
he died in the prime of life in consequence of an
accident which befel him on the Bridge of Wexford
soon after the entry of Lord Lake into the town after
the Battle of Vinegar Hill. There were also some
works of imperfect art representing ladies in high
waists and large hats. Among them was one of a
little girl afterwards destined to attain high renown in
the hunting field under the name of the 'Curragh
Filly.’

“All my early memories relate to hounds, horses
and hunting; there were hounds all over the place,
horses in the fields and men on horseback galloping,
blowing of horns, cracking of whips, tallyho-ing,
yoicksing and general uproar. If the weather was fine
on a hunting morning. Captain Jack was in fine spirits.
His voice could be heard above the tumult outside the
house, front and rear, as he sang : —

“ ‘ Tally ho, my boys I These are the joys
That far exceed the delights of the doxies 1
Hark to those sounds I hark to those sounds 1
The huntsman is on before with the hounds.’

6

BOYHOOD

[Chap. I.

That voice has been silent for more than ha] fa century,
but I hear it still as though the singer were in the next

“I was taught my prayers and rudimentary spelling by
my grandmother Kelly, I was also taught to cross myself
and to pray to the Virgin. I was taken to Mass, and I
could prattle Paternosters and Ave Marias. 1 had been
baptised as a Protestant, yet I was started with every
chance of running in the race of life as a Roman Catholic.

“ But the fates willed it otherwise. My grandfather
was a farmer, a graxier ; there had been bad seasons
and a fall in prices as well. There was trouble at Lilv
Vale. Men were stalking through the_ rooms with
pencils and note-books, writing; men in the fields
looking at the cattle, and writing ; men in the stables
examining horses and ponies, and writing ; men
measuring stacks in the farmyard, and writing. The
hounds were taken from the kennels — I was told for
the summer, but I never saw them again. The maids,
too, began packing up my things. I was going up to
Dublin, to my grandfather and grandmother Russell,
and ‘ I would come back very soon.’ But 1 never
returned to see Lily Vale as I had known it.

“ My grandfather William Russell in Dublin was
very different from the tenant of Lily' Vale, lie was
lame, but withal very active and alert ; a short, stout,
silver-haired, ruddy-cheeked man, clean shaven and
bright-eyed, with a stentorian voice and quick temper
which flamed out like gunpowder when tnc gout was
in possession and his Teg was bad.’ He wore an
enormous fold of muslin round his neck through which
was inserted a frill of the same material, called a
‘ Pentonville.’ In ’ 98 , in a charge on some * croppies,’
he received a kick from a horse from which he never
quite recovered. There was no fiercer man in politics
or religion. He had been a Moravian, but my grand-
mother made a condition that he should abjure that
belief as she did not approve of the ‘ kiss of peace to
sisters in the faith’; so he established a cnapel, in
which he was his own Pope. He was not altogether
cut off from the Church of Ireland.*

* His personal and irregular creed appears to have bean noted
among his friends as an agency for the repression of popery and the
assertion of the Protestant ascendancy.

1829 ]

THE HOUSE IN DUBLIN

7

“ The house where we lived, No. 40, Upper Baggot
Street, was a substantial brick house with a small
garden and coachhouse and stables in the rear. From
the front windows looking east there was a glimpse of
the sea and the Hill of Howth. At the back there was
an expanse of woodland up to the Sugar Loaf and
Three Rock Mountain and the fertile fields of Tallaght.”

A Mr. Parnell was in much request at old William
Russell’s house “ as a Christian and a brother
of Lord Congleton.” He was a big, solemn, man
whose pockets bulged with tracts which he projected
down areas and inserted under doors. When he
arrived at 40, Upper Baggot Street, the members of
the household knew that they were in for a dis-
course, at least an hour long, after evening prayers,
Mrs. Russell’s propensity to go off into a doze on Such
occasions provoked frequent remonstrances. Audible
signals of repose would sometimes be heard from her
armchair; and one night, suddenly waking up as
Mr. Parnell was relating the adventures of a missionary
with a lion, she confusedly exclaimed, “Yes, how
dreadful — ^was this all before he died ? ”

The Archdeacon of Clogher, the Rev. John Russell,
was William Howard Russell’s cousin. He was a
musician, poet, and the author of a book which is still
remembered, “ Wolfe’s Remains.” It was he who gave
the boy his first lessons in the Prayer Book and Bible.
He opposed the National Board, and lived and died
archdeacon, while Mr. Dickinson, his brother-in-law,
who took the opposite side, became chaplain to the
Archbishop and finally Bishop of Meath,

“ I remember,”, writes Russell, “ seeing these eccle-
siastics practise with boomerangs, and as the long, lean
gentlemen in knee breeches and black gaiters, frock
coats, and shovel hats, solemnly threw their curved
sticks in the air, the gaping labourers watched the

8

BOYHOOD

[Chap. I.

boomerangs skimming back over the meadows.
‘ Thim’s the divil’s own boys,’ was the remark of a hay-
rnaker on the top of a fence as he crossed himself. ‘ I’d
like Father Laffan to see thim.’ "

Russell’s education does not seem to have made
much progress until one memorable day his grand-
father caught him with the crook of his stick — a feat
he could perform with surprising suddenness and
certainty— evidently with an unusual intention. Before
the boy understood what was happening he found
himself before a door on which was a brass plate —
“Miss Steadman’s Day School for Young Ladies.”
“Here, Miss Steadman,” said the grandfather, I
have brought you the young gentleman we were
speaking of.”

Thus the boy was at school, “betrayed,” as he
writes, “ and moreover cabined and confined.” There
were boys as well as girls, but as Russell was the
largest and strongest boy in the school he soon became
absolute. He did not stay there very long before
being sent to other schools, exclusively for boys, as
will be presently related.

About this time (1831), Mrs. Hemans, the poetess,
and her sons came to live in Baggot Street,

“The boys’ picturesque dress,” writes Russell, “the
flowing curls, large turn-down cavalier collars, tunics
of blue velvet with buif belts, bright coloured hose
and rosetted shoes, produced an immense impression
on me. I thought them lovely as the angels.”

He knew that his own clothes were dingy and
unromantic by comparison. Just as he was emerging
from the flounce and frill into the jacket stage, his
grandfather appeared one day, with a large bale of
cloth which he had bought at an auction. Willie was
seized and measured for a suit by the local tailor.

MRS. HEMANS

9

1831]

For two or three years he figured in snuff-brown
suits which exposed him to considerable mental
suffering and to what he fancied was conspicuous
bodily degradation.

"The bale,” he says, “was stowed away in a small
room. Whenever a new suit was cut off I applied my
eye to the keyhole, but the bale seemed to be as
large as ever. I have reason to think it came to an
untimely end. I was called ‘ Snuffy,’ ' Brownie,’
‘ Gingerbread Billy ’ and other opprobrious names,
and more than once the honour of my cloth was
vindicated to the detriment of its colour by what the
Scotch call ‘injuries to the effusion of blood.’ ”

Returning to Mrs. Hemans, he continues : —

“ She wore robes of a classical type, and to me
there was something very stately and imposing in her
slow, measured steps, her eyes which were bright and
sad, her sweet smile and her gentle voice. And what
touched me most was the superiority of the children —
the youngest a little older than I was. It was first
brought home to me by their mother; she was reading
for us the life of Spagnoletto out of ‘Triumphs of
Genius and Perseverance,’ and she asked ; ‘ Willie,
what is genius ? ’ I had not the least idea, but I
fancied it must have some connection with another
book ‘Tales of the Genii.’ I dared not say so. ‘And
what is perseverance ? ’ Silence. ‘Now, boys, what
do you say ? ’ They appeared to know all about it.
And I could not tell what a ‘ substantive ’ or _ an
‘ adjective ’ was. One of the boys played the guitar
and sang, another drew trees and houses and animals,
and a third wrote in a book ‘ things out of his head.’
They said French lessons and German lessons, and
were learning Latin, botany, history, and geography.”

Russell has recorded that they laughed at him when
he asked them what was meant in his prayer by the
words “ to keep down satin under my feet.” The pity
they betrayed for him seems to have kindled the fire
within him. He made a desperate attempt .to overtake

lO

BOYHOOD

[Chap. 1.

their knowledge, and the struggle was only ended, to
his great grief, by the departure of the Homans
family.

“Our parting,” he writes, “was most sorrowful.
At our last meeting Mrs. liemans said, ‘ Willie, sing
“Love not” for us, please.’ That and the ‘Merry
Swiss Boy ’ constituted my musical repertoire. I was
warbling disconsolately * Love not, love not, the thing
you love may die,’ when I was interrupted by a sob
from Mrs. Hemans who was playing the accompani-
ment. The piano ceased. Rising from her scat with
streaming eyes she threw her arms round my neck.
‘May die, alas I must die,’ she exclaimed, and left the
room. Presently she came back with a little book for
me, kissed me and bade me good-night, and thus we
parted — I with many promises and pledges, never to
be ratified.”

In Hume Street, Dublin, there were in those days
two schools of repute. Russell was entered in the
junior class of that which was presided over by
Dr. Wall, a sedate and scholarly ecclesiastic whose
methods of instruction were all his own. But Dr. Wall
turned out good scholars, and was in favour with
parents of the professional class.

Russell writes : “ He handed over the younger boys
to the junior masters, and as I was vivacious, idle and
a good deal spoilt, I was singled out by a morose,
young tyrant; who imitated as far as he could, the
methods of his chief in signal and painful correctiont”

This master inflicted his punishments indifferently
with a ruler and the edge of a slate. When the boy
exhibited his swollen fingers and puflfed-up palms at
home it was some solace to hear the sympathising
moans of the sorrowing circle, but he records that
no one asked whether he deserved what he got.
Apparently, however, the family prevailed over his
grandfather, who had a firm belief in the virtues of

DR. GEOGHEGAN

II

1831-36]

the argumentum haculinum, and at the end of the halif
Russell was transferred to the other school in Hume
Street, kept by the Rev. E. J. Geoghegan.

He has written of Dr. Geoghegan’s school : —

“ In that house I spent some of the happiest years
of my life, and assuredly it was my own fault that I
didn’t turn to good account the teaching of one of the
kindest of friends and most indulgent of masters.
How_ deeply I am indebted to that just, considerate,
and inflexible man perhaps I do not, with all my
gratitude, understand. But he was by no means a
moral force enthusiast. Pandying was practised as a
disciplinary agent in education. How horribly painful
it was 1 The hard-hearted, yellow rattan in its shining
coat would hiss through the air as the culprit obeyed
the command, ‘ Hold out your hand, friend ’ ; and as it
fell, miserable pain ran from palm to elbow welling
into red-hot torture, if by involuntary withdrawal of
the hand, the blow came at the end of the fingers.
Throb by throb the anguish filtered away after the
tyranny was overpast, leaving a moral residuum in
which a cautious resolve not to incur the punishment
again was mingled with resentment.”

There was a keen competition among the Dublin
masters in editing school text-books, but Russell
loyally affirms that Geoghegan's editions of Xenophon,
of Caesar, and of Alvarez's Prosody were in the first
flight ; and late in his life the battered old volumes,
which he had once held in so little regard, were of
his most treasured possessions. Among his school-
fellows at Geoghegan's were Dion Boucicault, and
one who became his life-long friend, Henry de Bathe,
afterwards General Sir Henry de Bathe. He
remained at this school until, as he says, he was
“ turned out into the world.”

CHAPTER II

COLLEGE AND JOURNALISM

Russell’s jSrst literary adventure, when he was
sixteen years old, was provoked by the appearance of
the Dublin Penny Journal An edition of “ I^uffon,”
which had been lent to him by a friend of his father,
had given him a taste for natural history, especially for
birds. In a boy a taste of that kind frequently expresses
itself in a desire to kill the objects of his affection.

“One day," Russell writes, “ I saw a curious sort of
a lark on a furrow in a field. There was a tuft on it.s
head which Riquet would have been proud of. I
remembered the injunctions I had received, ‘ when you
fire at a bird on the ground aim at its feet.’ Bang ! the
lark lay on his back with his legs in the air. Yes, it
was a strange bird. I put the corpse on a sheet of
paper at home, drew the outlines, set down details, and
then I wrote a letter to the editor of the Dublin Penny
Journal, enclosed the drawing, and delivered the
precious manuscript at the office.”

He was enraptured the following week by hearing
one of his friends say, “Do you see some fellow has
shot a strange lark in one of these fields ? There’s an
account of it in the Dublin Penny Journal^' Russell
made for a stationer’s shop, bought the paper, and read
over and over again about the ^^Alauda cristata found
in Irelamd. He lent the journal to his grandmother,
who paid no attention to the discovery, and he threw it
carelessly in the way of his aunts, with the casual
observation that there was a picture of a strange bird
which had been shot behind Verschoyle’s Church,

1836]

THE CRESTED LARK

13

This drew from one of his aunts, “ I daresay it was
Jenny Osborne’s parrot. It escaped last week.”

Candour compels us to pursue the subject of the
crested lark. The statement made in the Dublin Penny
Journal of February 27, 1836, has been referred to in
every standard work on Irish birds, and consequently
has obtained a certain importance. Seventy years
after its publication it was examined rather carefully
by the Dublin Daily Express.

“ As no other specimen of the crested lark,” said the
Daily Express, “ is known to have been obtained in
Ireland either before or since the date of William
Russell’s record, it may seem strange that attention
should ever have been concentrated upon it, but both
Thompson and Watters, though ignorant of the writer’s
identity, thought the matter worth a reference.”

In More’s list of Irish birds it is remarked that the
bird “does not appear to have been satisfactorily
identified.” Ussher, however, particularly included
the crested lark among the birds of Ireland on the
strength of this solitary record. When Russell him-
self was applied to for information in 1897 he said that
he had taken the lark to a Mr. Colville, a member of
the Royal Dublin Society, who almost immediately
declared that it was a crested lark.

As the Dublin Express observes : —

“ The one unsatisfactory element in the affair is that
nothing is said about what became of the specimen. It
would have been a great treasure for any museum — ^the
only specimen of a bird which has been seen only a few
times in England and, except on this disputed occasion,
never in Ireland. After some correspondence with
Russell in 1897, Mr. Ussher asked him plainly what he
did with the bird, to which the answer was, ‘ Probably
we ate him.’ ”

14 COLLEGE AND JOURNALISM [Chap. IL

In these circumstances one cannot question the
sagacity of the Dublin Express when it remarks : —

“ We are afraid until another alauda cristata turns up
on Irish soil doubts will continue to be cast on the
propriety of admitting it to our fauna on the authority of
a member of the Royal Dublin Society, who could
suggest to a boy no more suitable way of disposing of
such a bird than having it cooked. The crest of the
common skylark varies a good deal in size, and a mis-
take is always possible. That is all that can be said.
We are all entitled to our doubts, but no one will ever
be able to prove that the bird behind Verschoyle’s
Church was not a crested lark.”

Russell, indeed, was never strictly an ornithologist,
although all his life he used the open eyes of an obser-
vant man and roughly noted the fauna and flora of
whatever country he might be in. Early in life he
became a fisherman, and the sport remained with him
a passion to be cultivated in all circumstances promising
or unpromising.

One day he saw in a shop in Kildare Street a book
covered with sporting emblems, “The Posthumous
Papers of the Pickwick Club,” edited by Boz. It was
the first number, just out, price is. Russell writes : —

“I bought the number in full confidence that it
related to_ sport, angling, etc., and was disappointed to
find that it was what appeared to me at first glimpse a
foolish story, ‘ The Theory of Tittlebats,’ ‘ The Pond at
Hampstead,’ and so on. It was a shilling lost. But I
carried my book to a bench in Stephen’s Green for
further examination. In five minutes a new world
was open to me. I have been living in it ever since.”

The death of Russell’s grandfather came like a thief
in the night in 1837. In a moment the family was face
to face with want.

“There was a small insurance rent and charge,” writes
Russell, “for my grandmother and her daughters.

1837] A TUTORSHIP 15

the lease of the house, the furniture, a pair of
horses, and an old chaise ; and out of all there might
be screwed a pittance to keep body and soul together
and put a modest covering on the combination. But
what was to become of college and my career ? I was
seventeen years of age.”

The only fruitful suggestion was that Russell should
try for a sizarship at Trinity College, Dublin. But
that would need at least a year’s hard work, and mean-
while the family was broken up, and the Baggot Street
house must be abandoned. The solution came not out
of deliberation, but by accident. A distant relation
offered Russell a tutorship in County Leitrim. “To
become a tutor I ” writes he. “ Heavens, what an
Alnaschar finish to my dreams I ” It did not comfort
him to be told that Lord Chancellor this, and Bishop
that, and all the fellows of Trinity College, had
been tutors. Nevertheless, the post was accepted.
Mr. O’Brien, his employer, was a hard-headed, hard-
riding, alert man, active as a magistrate and adaman-
tine as a land agent. Mrs. O’Brien was as a mother
to the young tutor.

“ My pupils,” writes Russell, “ were docile and
affectionate if not very hard-working or bright. We
rode out with or without hounds; we fished in the
streams near at hand and in the lochs a few miles
distant; and I read for my entrance examination at
Trinity with a proud feeling that I was working for
myself and would ask no one for anything over and
above my entrance fee.”

The time passed quickly, and when Russell presented
himself for examination at Trinity the only feeling he
had, so far as he could remember afterwards, was that
he would have liked a little more time, “just to go over
my Horace and Homer again, and to have another run
through my Euclid and Algebra.”

i6 COLLEGE AND JOURNALISM [Chap. II.

He has left no narrative of his career at Trinity, and
his name does not appear in the list of graduates. He
did not win a sizarship or scholarship, and his relations
somehow bore the expense of his education. F or some
time he did not abandon the ambition of ultimately
reading for a fellowship. A combination of want of
money and of temptations to other occupations, how-
ever, divided his attention. When he was in his
twentieth year, and not yet due to leave college, it was
borne in upon him by his friends and relations “that
he must be up and stirring,” though he has not for-
gotten to remark that no suggestion was made as to
what he should be up to or what he should stir. At
this time his cousin John Russell, who was an army
surgeon, and had recently returned from Botany Bay,
proposed that he should walk the hospitals. His
cousin’s uniform induced Russell to think seriously of
becoming an army surgeon. “ My eye,” he says, “ has
always exercised a great influence over my mind ” —
sure token that he was born with the instinct of a
correspondent. One of the leading Irish doctors pro-
mised to make the way smooth, but another suggested
that before entering his name as a student Russell
ought to visit his cousin Richard Croker Russell, who
was studying at a certain college for surgeons. The
suggestion was adopted.

“ It has been my fate,’’ writes Russell, “ to have seen
death in many forms, but the horror of the apparatus
of the tables can never be forgotten. I remember one
student with a pewter pot and a plate of bread and
cheese before him in the midst of it all, reading aloud
from Harrison’s ‘Anatomy.’ I was quite overcome,
and my face revealed my feelings. The leering porter
who had come up with me to the room — it was said he
had sold his mother’s body for dissection — put his
dirty paw on my shoulder and told me I should soon

17

i84i] reporting THE ELECTIONS

get used to it. I rushed to the door — exit Podalirius.
Never! Never!”

In 1841 Russell was still at college, with his career
unsettled, and the time was at hand when his relations
would positively no longer be able to help him with
money, which indeed appeared to bring no promise of
adequate academic returns. In this year, however, a
fortunate event happened which was destined to shape
his life, little though he guessed it at the time. His
cousin Robert Russell arrived in Ireland charged by
the Times with the management, in a newspaper sense,
of the Irish elections. The Melbourne Ministry, which
had been in office since 1835, was beaten in August,
1841, and Sir Robert Peel undertook to form a Tory
Government. Robert Russell wanted to organise a
staff of young fellows competent to write plain, trust-
worthy accounts of what they saw in Ireland. He
came to Russell. “ You will have a pleasant time of
it,” he said, “ if you will do the work — letters to the
best people, one guinea a day and your hotel expenses.
Will you start next week ? ”

“ I did not hesitate a moment,” writes Russell. “ Of
political principles I had none except a vague attach-
ment to the Orangeism of Baggot Street which
represented Protestant ascendancy in Church and
State, the ‘ Glorious, Pious, Immortal memory,’ and an
inclination to prompt participation in any rows with
Repeal mobs. It seemed as if the day would never
come when I was to take my place on the box of the
mail for Longford, where Mr. Lefroy was to fight the
battle for Church and State against the powers of
darkness. To hear my name, ‘ Mr. Russell of the
Times,’ pronounced by an anxious agent as the coach
pulled up at Sutcliffe’s Hotel in the dismal little town
which was quivering with passion and the noise of
bands, patriots and priests— rthis indeed was fame.”

R. — VOL. I. C

i8 COLLEGE AND JOURNALISM [Chap. II.

Through delay on the road, Russell had already
missed some noticeable incidents, all of which may be
safely summed up under the head of riots. It was
necessary for him to pick up what information he
could, and he was unwilling to rely entirely on the
stories of one side. But where was he to get his
ideally impartial information? He reflected that he
was reporting not only an election, but an Irish elec-
tion, and, with a mother wit which he was always proud
to remember afterwards, he made his way straight to
the hospital. There he found the wounded heroes of
both sides, and those whose heads were not too
seriously broken gave him as much information as he
desired, and more.

The experiences of the day were not yet over ; after
his visit to the hospital he dined with Mr. Lefroy and
his committee and sat at a long table with “ influential
Tories.” In the midst of an eloquent speech from a
rector there came from the street the blare of a brass
band playing “The Harp that once through Tara’s
Halls,” which was accepted as an Irish Marseillaise.
Groans and howls interrupted the rector — not so
effectually, however, as bricks and paving stones
which smashed the windows and bounded on the table.

“Are ye hurt, me dear boy?" inquired Russell’s
neighbour

“I could have said ‘yes,’” writes Russell, “for I
was struck by a paving stone the size of a penny roll
on the back of mv head. The lights swam before my
eyes, but in another minute I was in the street at the
tad of the indignant Tories who had rushed out of the
hotel and were already comforting themselves by
religious and constitutional methods of disapprovaL
Before the night was over I found myself clouded
With tobacco smoke and reeking with whisky punch,

WIGS ON THE GREEN

19

1841]

addressing a convivial assembly about Magna Charta
(an eminently Protestant document), the Bill of Rights,
the Defence of Derj^, the Inquisition, the Barn of
Scullabogue,* Peter Dens’ Theology, t What a head-
ache I had in the morning I ”

Between his visits to the hospital and the exhilarating
and violent dinner with the “influential Tories,”
Russell managed to write his first dispatch to the
Times. It appeared five days after it was written,
and the following passage is taken from it to illustrate
the unequivocal temper in which he entered the fray
in spite of the impartial information of the hospital.

“I have this moment returned from a visit to the
Infirmary and never was I more affected than I was

During the rebellion in Wexford, in 1798, two hundred and
twenty Protestants were killed in the barn of Scullabogue.

t The writings of Peter Dens were circulated by the Protestant
Association in order to shock and arouse Protestant feeling. Some
Roman Catholic bishops, however, disavowed Peter Dens. A
correspondence with O’Connell was started by the Protestant
Association. A member of the Association wrote to O’Connell in
June, 1836, enclosing this message from the Rev. R. M’Ghee : —

“ Having been requested to attend a meeting to be held in Exeter
Hall on July 125, it is my intention, if it pleases Divine Providence
to allow me, to submit to the meeting resolutions containing some
additional facts as to Dens’ theology which have not been laid before
the public, and which prove the unanimous and continued adoption
of the standard of theology by your bishops ; and also establishing
the fact that your bishops have patronised and propagated among
the people the intolerant and persecuting notes of the Rhemish
Testament ...”

To this, O’Connell sent the following delightfully characteristic
answer : —

“ Reverend Sir, — I have reason to complain, I really think I
have, that you should transmit to me any document emanating from
the person who styles himself the Rev. Robert M’Ghee. After that
unhappy person’s exhibition in public, and especially after his
indescribable conduct to that meek and venerable prelate, Dr.
Murray, I do submit to your own good sense and good feeling that
you ought not to inflict any letter of his upon any fellow Christian.
, . , With respect to Dens and the Rhemish Notes, I confess to you
that I feel the utmost indifference as to the Resolutions your meeting
of the 12th July may adopt ...”

c 2

20

COLLEGE AND JOURNALISM [Chap. IL

by the horrid sights I witnessed. With countenances
crushed and bruised and bathed in blood are lying a
number of poor fellows, some of whom it is to be
feared are fast hastening to another world. One or
two of these suffered in the town, but the greater
number were attacked on their way home. Mr. Lefroy
is still in the minority. Even men who voluntarily
registered their solemn promise to keep away were
the very first to vote for the Whites in defiance of
their agreements (oftentimes written ones), being
compelled to do so by priestly interference, despite the
deference they were willing to pay their landlords.
In addition to the scenes of violence I have already
witnessed, I regret to say that I have to record an
atrocious attack made this day upon a harmless young
gentleman named King, who, while standing near his
own house in the middle of the day not twenty yards
from the barracks, and within a hundred yards of an
immense force of military and police, was attacked by
a number of pitiless miscreants, beaten, trampled
under foot, and left helpless on the road. He is now, or
rather his inanimate body is, lying in the Infirmary,
his life despaired. This is the manner in which these
sanguinary ruffians have carried out the principles of
their revered pastors’ admonitions. How much have
those pastors to answer for, what a sea of blood lies at
their door ! I know not what terms of reprobation to
use with reference to another character, but believe
the bare fact will be quite enough to_ brand with
disgrace the man who, blinded by faction, deserted
his country and his religion, and joined the enemy of
both. Dean Burgh, a dignitary of the Established
Church, was the first to come forward to record his
vote in favour of the men who would support a Govern-
ment which ardently desires to deal heavy blows and
great discouragement to Protestants, and as soon as
he had done so he hastened to double his disgrace by
posting off to Kildare, there to vote for men still more
ifitra than the Messrs. White. It being extremely
dangerous to leave the parts of the streets lined with
the military, I cannot procure accurate information
as to the state of the suburbs; in fact, I have been
warned that I am a marked man.”

i84i] RUSSELL AND THE AMAZONS 21

As soon as possible a letter came from Robert
Russell : — “ Your work is capital, a most effective
description.” But that counted as nothing when the
Times of July 24th appeared with a leader on Russell’s
“ burning words ” and when he received the thanks of
the candidate and his committee.

Next the editor desired that “young Mr. Russell
may be sent to Carlow, where a great fight is expected.”
In a few days he was flying from one election to
another and getting his reward in the shape of Sola
Bills from the Bank of England, which he had never
seen before. At Athlone he had an experience which
was outrageous even judged by the standard of Irish
elections. He was speaking to the Tory candidate.
Major Beresford, in front of the hotel when a multitude
of women screaming and gesticulating came upon them
and Russell was seized by “ this shoal of octopuses.”
He received slaps, pinches, and scratches, and it seems
a few spiteful kisses, while he was dragged and hustled
towards the Shannon, where it was evidently the
intention of his captors to give him a “shiver.” A
party of police rescued him, but he was so covered
with mud that he had to be wiped down like a horse
in a stableyard before he could go to his room to
change his clothes.

They were wild elections, indeed ; passion and cor-
ruption on one side and intimidation and outrage on
the other, all saturated and highly flavoured with
whisky. Russell has confessed that he threw neutrality
to the winds (if he ever possessed it, which may be
doubted by any reader of the Longford despatches)
and plunged into the excitement with a furious joy,
accepting violent episodes as a nervous stimulant.
He was elated by the praise of his employers, and

22 COLLEGE AND JOURNALISM [Chap. II.

comforted by the prospects which opened before him.
The result was an inevitable unsettling of his plans,
but still he appears to have retained some sort of
intention of trying to win a fellowship at Trinity
College.

CHAPTER III

THE REPEAL AGITATION IN IRELAND

At the end of the elections Russell went to London
to see the elder Delane, who was manager of the
Times. Delane asked him friendly questions, and
Russell frankly discussed with him his hopes and
fears ; his wish to take a degree and read for a fellow-
ship, a secondary thought of being called to the Bar,
and the necessity of paying his way if he were to
do either. Delane suggested that he should come
permanently to London, get a transfer ad eundem in
statu pupillari to a college at Cambridge, and hold
himself at the disposal of the Times, which needed
a young gentleman with his readiness and knowledge
of Ireland. A visit to Cambridge, however, where he
spent a fortnight, convinced Russell that there were
temptations which he might be unable to resist. He
often admitted that in the management of his finances
he had no great aptitude, and he therefore decided
that he must live in London and somehow earn enough
to live upon while he read with the purpose of returning
to Trinity College, Dublin. Journalism had indeed
been a festive means of raking in the Sola Bills for
a short time, but somehow Delane could not give any
guarantee that that brief golden age would be repeated
in the different circumstances of London. Russell
sensibly felt that he must have something more
definite than Delane’s undertaking that he would give
him work “ whenever possible,” and he did not neglect

24

THE REPEAL AGITATION [Chap. HI.

to consider the possibility of binding himself to other
employers.

Thinking that it would be as well to have some
authoritative testimony to his capacity for the work he
proposed to himself, he wrote to his old schoolmaster,
Dr. Geoghegan, who answered ;

^'January Zth, 1842.

“ My Dear Russell,— You tell me that you arc looking
for a situation as reporter to a newspaper, and it seems
to me that you have hit upon the very thing for which
you are best fitted. You possess, I know, a good store
of classical and general information, which united to
suitable natural talents and quickness of perception,
ought to make you a first-rate person in that depart-
ment of literary labour. I hope sincerely that you may
succeed in obtaining the object of your wishes, and if
my testimony as to your qualifications for the office
can be of the least service to you you may command it
at any time, for I could say with perfect truth that
I believe you to possess the very qualities requisite to
form a good reporter.

“With best wishes for your success,

“ I remain,

“ Yours faithfully,

“ E. J. Geoghegan.”

This letter is not only a testimonial to Russell ; it is
a testimonial to Geoghegan. The discrimination with
which he marked Russell’s peculiar qualities, and
without hesitation named the uses to which they could
be put, is an explaationn of his success as a school-
master. Whether or not Russell offered himself in the
open market with this letter for recommendation, it
seems that he was not above accepting employment of
any kind which promised him a livelihood. About
this time he was offered and accepted the position of
junior mathematical master at Kensington Grammar
School, a proprietary school which had been established
in 1830, at 31, Kensington Square.

1842] KENSINGTON GRAMMAR SCHOOL 25

“The master of the school, Dr. Wilkinson,”* he
writes, “ one of the most bland and polished of eccle-
siastics, received me with kindness, though obviously-
disconcerted by the unmistakeable realism of my
accent. One of the masters was Hugh Willoughby
Jermyn, afterwards Primus of Scotland; amiable,
earnest, sincere, and of great simplicity and piety,
he was always dear to all who knew him.”

In the evenings after his work Russell ought to have
read, but frequently the impulse would seize him to
sally off and see London and his friends. If too late
for -an omnibus, he would often drive on a market cart
from High Street. He became known to the Covent
Garden wagoners by the easy introduction of a glass
of beer. He sat on the vegetables, and when the
wagon arrived at St. Martin's Lane, he would slip
down and make his way to King William Street, where
his friends were carousing.

‘‘ It was all very wrong,” he wrote, with the belated
wisdom of age. “We used to adjourn for, supper
to the ‘ Cock,' and finally I would set out for Ken-
sington just as the sun was rising. I do not care to
remember how often I repeated that morning walk.”

He seems to have repeated it often enough to make
the vision of a fellowship become increasingly dim,
and it was not long before thoughts of being called
to the Bar disputed with the fellowship for the first
place in his mind.

His cousin, Robert Russell, was at this time on the
Parliamentary staff of the Times. He was also engaged
on the Mirror of Parliament^ and prepared law reports
for some local journal and corresponded with the
Independance Beige. Altogether he earned what seemed
to Russell the colossal sum of ;^i,30o a year.

* Afterwards the Master of Marlborough*

26 THE REPEAL AGITATION [Chap. III.

“ He appeared to me,” says Russell, “ a man of extra-
ordinary ability, whereas he was a very industrious,
plodding fellow of average attainments.”

He asked Russell if he intended to remain at school
work all his life.

“You have only to learn shorthand, study composi-
tion and style, and send in articles to papers and
magazines regardless of rejection. If you put your
heart and soul into it, I ani certain you will do well ;
you can keep your terms and go to the Bar just
the same.”

At the end of his first term at Kensington School,
Russell was informed that the arrangement with the
junior mathematical master would not be continued.
Under his cousin Robert’s advice he therefore applied
himself to writing, and sent innumerable stories and
papers to magazines and journals, besides learning
shorthand. The editor of a sporting review accepted
a paper on trout fishing, enclosed three guineas, and
promoted Russell to the seventh heaven by suggesting
that he should write again. A story of an adventure
with the Irish police, founded, it must be confessed, on
an experience when Russell was a tutor in County
Leitrim, was accepted by a highly respectable magazine,
and a more ambitious tale was returned by Bentley,
with a request that the author would cut it down and
submit it again. Such small or partial successes had
all the significance which belong to early attempts, and
Russell could remember the details of them in his old
age when a great deal of vastly more important
achievements had slipped from his memory.

In spite of his labours his purse became even lighter
than before. But fortunately J. T. Delane, the editor
of the Times, had not forgotten his services in Ireland
the year before, and learning that he had quickly

1842-3] PARLIAMENTARY REPORTING

27

made himself proficient in shorthand, he offered him
a post on the reporting staff of the Times in the Press
Gallery of the House of Commons. Russell gladly
accepted the offer and reported part of the Session
of 1842. This work left him unemployed in the recess,
except when he was sent occasionally to describe
some meeting or ceremony and thus earned a few
extra guineas. He passed an anxious winter; as he
had not the art of thrift his money had flown in the
good times of the Session. He did not, however,
betray his anxiety, if we may judge from an entry in
his diary, in which he records that his cousin Robert
reproved him for unbecoming cheerfulness.

One simple solution which occurred to him for tiding
over his financial difficulties was to demand a higher
salary from the Times for his reporting. The following
answer from Delane, the first of many letters from
him which have been preserved, shows thus early a
material appreciation of Russell’s ability piercing the
inexorable nature of office rules on promotion and pay-
ment. One notes the delicate arrangement of the letter,
by which the more important part, from the official
point of view, is placed first and the distinctly more
important part, from Russell’s point of view, second : —

'^January 20th, 1843.

“ My Dear Sir, — After giving your letter all con-
sideration, and without at all detracting from the
merit you justly claim for your zealous services, we
are of opinion that we cannot in justice to your
colleagues make a permanent addition to your present
salary. In acknowledgment, however, of the zeal and
ability you have displayed during the recess, 1 have
the pleasure to request your acceptance of the enclosed
cheque. “Believe me ever

“Yours faithfully,

“John T. Delane.”

28

THE REPEAL AGITATION [Chap. III.

In the autumn of 1843 Russell was instructed by
the Times to attend the Repeal meetings in Ireland.
O’Connell was fulfilling his promise to hold meetings
to agitate for the Repeal of the Union all over Ireland.
In that one year he travelled five thousand miles.
There were about eight million people in Ireland,
and three-quarters of the men and women were
“ Repealers." The great meeting on the Hill of
Tara had been held on August 15 th, and the Nation
had estimated the audience at three-quarters of a
million. The passions of Ireland were aflame, and
yet O’Connell, although he could never forbear to
employ his extraordinary power over the people and
to excite them to frenzy and exaltation, had so fixr
refused to advocate the violence which he often
seemed to hint. This was not satisfactory to the
Young Ireland party, and urged by them O’Connell
at last crossed the border between indiscreet and
apparently seditious language. Russell arrived when
it was still doubtful whether O’Connell, in despite of
his partial defection, would be able to save the day
for his traditional policy of moral suasion against the
more “ forward ’’ policy of Young Ireland.

It is not often that a reporter describes events to
which he has such an intimate relation as Russell had
to this Repeal agitation. From his childhood, as wc
have seen, the quarrels between Protestants and
Roman Catholics had resounded in his ears. With
the phrases and names '‘Repeal of the Union,”
“ Catholic Emancipation,’’ ” Protestant Ascendancy,”
“the number of the beast,’’ "Tresham Gregg,’’*
“ Father Maguire,” and so on, he had long been

Orangemen, and the

leader and idol of the Protestant operatives.

1843 ] the “MONSTER MEETINGS”

29

familiar. His grandfather had been accustomed to
repeat Lord Eldon’s awful warning “ that the day
Catholic Emancipation was granted the sun of England
would set for ever.” When he found himself in the
middle of the whole assembly of “ disunionists ” —
Repealers and Roman Catholics — he felt, in his own
words, very much “ as a Puritan would have felt in
the company of malignants.” He adds : —

“ But after a while I made them out to be, apart
from their politics, as pleasant as other people ; though
I could not for some time get over the shock of seeing
Protestants or non-Catholics like Sharman Crawford *
of the white waistcoat, Dillon Browne, and others
cheering in the wake of the Liberator’s car.”

Russell attended many of the famous “monster
meetings.”

“The scene at my first ‘ monster meeting,’ he writes, t
“ was one never to be forgotten. It was at the Rath of
Mullaghmast,! where tradition had it that a treacherous
slaughter of the Irish was perpetrated in the reign of
Elizabeth. O’Connell made the most of the story,
revelling in details. He also described a massacre,
which he said was perpetrated by Cromwell, when
three hundred women were slaughtered round the
Cross of Christ in Wexford, with dramatic power

* ‘‘O’Connell’s reception of Sharman Crawford at the Dublin
meeting was so unfriendly as to prevent co-operation between them
afterwards when co-operation would have produced important
public results. When Crawford was addressing himself, in a some-
what hard and formal manner, to the question whether the substitu-
tion of rent-charge for tithe ought to have been accepted on behalf
of Ireland, O’Connell kept interposing grotesque questions, such as,
‘What brought you here, Sharman, my jewel?’ ‘What are you
after, Crawford, my man ? ’ and bantering comments on his white
waistcoat.” (“ Young Ireland,” by Gavan Duffy.)

t This account of the Repeal agitation in Ireland, taken from
'Russell’s autobiography, was published in the Anti-Jacobin, edited
by Mr. Frederick Greenwood, February 14th, 1891.

{ For the greatest meetings historical sites were chosen which
would appeal to the enthusiasm of the people. At MuUaghmast, the
national cap was presented to O’Connell.

30

THE REPEAL AGITATION [Chap. III.

beyond compare. ‘They prayed to Heaven for
mercy ! ’ he exclaimed. ‘ f trust they found it ! They
prayed to the English for pity and Cromwell slaughtered
them I We were a paltry remnant then. We are
millions now.’ The men yelled and danced with rajj-e ;
the women screamed and clapped their hands. The
vast multitude— I believe there were really 100,000
present— moved and moaned like a wild beast in
^igony.

“ I have never heard any orator who made so great
an impression on me as O’Connell. It was not his
argument, for it was often worthless, nor his language,
which was frequently inelegant. It was his immense
passion, his pathos, his fiery indignation. At first
sight one was tempted to laugh at the green cloth cap,
with the broad gold band set on the top of his curly
wig— his round chin buried deep in the collar of a
remarkable compromise between a travelling cloak
and a frock, green and ornamented with large gilt
buttons ; but when he rose to speak with imperious
gestures for silence, and was ‘ off,’ in a few minutes
the spell began to work; the orator was revealed.
As a speaker addressing a mob — a meeting of his own
countrymen — I do not believe anyone equalled, or
that anyone will equal, O’Connell.

“ The meetings combined the attractions of a fair
and a festival, of a national demonstration and a
merry-making. There were Repeal brass bands in
and out of uniform, with flags and banners of
‘immortal green.’ There were fiddlers and pipers,
ballad singers and sellers, refreshment stands stored
with cakes and the preparations of tempcrancc-cordial
chemists. The women and men were in their best —
sometimes very far from the positive degree of the
adjective — farmers were mounted on horses and
ponies with extraordinary saddlery, and a sea of faces
turned towards the platform where the Liberator
was to be seen if not heard. He was always
courteous to the ‘ press-gang,’ as he called the
reporters, especially to those of the English papers,
but he did not bridle his tongue when he had to speak
of the organs of ‘ the base, bloody, and brutal Whigs.’
‘ Let Mr. Russell past, boys ! He is no relation of

31

1843] the O’CONNELL TOUCH

Lord John (cheers). The young gentleman, I daresay,
does not like being a Times-sexver after all ’ (laughter).
Some of my descriptions of the meetings excited his
anger, and he was greatly incensed by observations I
made on the statements respecting the numbers
attending the meetings at Loughrea and Clifden, for
example. But at Tara, Mullaghmast and Kilkenny
the mass of people could not be easily estimated.
How he flattered and tickled his audience could only
be realised by those who were present. For instance,
at Clifden, there was a body of some three hundred
or four hundred men, mounted on the ragged, diminu-
tive ponies of Connemara, drawn up as a guard of
honour. ‘ What a magnificent sight, these noble
cavaliers 1 ’ he exclaimed, * 1 would like to see any
cavalry in the world venture to meddle with you, or to
follow you up yonder mountains ! ’ And as the cheers
which greeted the first compliment died away at the
remote allusion to a retrograde movement, he thundered
out, ‘ If I know anything of you, horse or man, you
would send the enemy’s dragoons flying like chaff
before the wind!’ And they believed every word
of it.

" Many curious and amusing incidents occurred in
the serious business of the agitation, which was soon
to be terminated by one vigorous act of the Govern-
ment. There was a crusade against English, or to be
correct, in favour of Irish, manufactures, and it was
the fashioii to wear ‘ Repeal ’ coats of frieze, poplin
waistcoats, and the like. The members of the ‘ 82’
Club, which was started by O’Connell, were_ clad in a
uniform of special unsuitableness. It consisted of a
green cap and gold band, green coat and gilt buttons,
with ‘ 82^ on them, white vest and green trousers with
gold stripes. But the coats and the club did not last
as long as the agitation. At the close of each ‘ monster
meeting ’ there was a ‘ monster banquet.’ The night
of the meeting at Castlebar, a dinner was given by a
hospitable barrister (an active member of the Repeal
Association, who afterwards became Solicitor^ to the
Customs in England) to members of Parliament,
pressmen, and others ; and I was among the guests.
It was a prodigal banquet — enormous salmon, turkeys

32

THE REPEAL AGITATION [Chap. III.

‘ that could draw a gig,’ huge joints, boiled and roast,
oceans of claret, champagne, and punch. National
songs were sung, and the entertainment wound up
with a grand dance in the kitchen, in which the maids,
fascinated by the splendour of the ‘ 82 ’ uniform, joined
con amore. Long before the festivities came to an end
I left the company with Dillon Browne for our hotel.
As we were groping our way through thc_ street—
there was only one oil lamp at the end of it — I saw
some bright object on the ground. I put down my
hand ; it was the gold band of an ‘ 82 ’ cap, the owner
of which lay in the gutter. Wc strove to raise the
gentleman, and put him on his legs. ‘ Let me alone,’
he exclaimed ; ‘ I’m busy, I tell you I ’ ‘ Who arc you,
and where do you live ? ’ ‘Go away I Don’t disturb

me 1 I’m Mr. , of the Tuam Herald. I’m writing a

layder.’ We had difficult work to conduct the leader-
writer to his lodgings.

“ I do not think magnanimity was amongst
O’Connell’s qualities. Mr. Thomas Campbell Foster,
the Times Commissioner, reported the results of a visit
to the Derrynane estate* which revealed the existence
almost under the windows of Derrynane Abbey, the
Liberator’s residence, of an unspeakably wretched
wigwamry, inhabited by fever-stricken, squaljd crea-
tures, whose condition would have filled a Zulu or
fellah with pity and disgust. The fiery assailant of
neglectful landlords, the champion of the degraded
peasantry, had on his estate, it was asserted, the most
miserable tenantry in all Ireland, and that was saying
a good deal.

“ This account of the horrors of Derrynane was
hailed with rapture by every paper in England,
Scotland and Wales, and by the Conservative Press in
Ireland. It formed the text of innumerable leading
articles ; was translated into all the languages of
Europe. It was in truth a tremendous ^ indictment
against the ‘Liberator,’ the ‘Father of his country,’
and the landlord of Derrynane Abbey, whence had
been sent so many proclamations, addresses and
letters, to ‘ my dear Ray,’ full of the noblest sentiments,

* This was in 1843. In these reminiscences Russell mingles his
dates freely.

i84S1 O’CONNELL’S PEASANTRY

33

and flashing with scorn for the tyrants who dis-
regarded the cry of the poor. The rage of O’Connell
revealed the pain he felt at the injury inflicted on his
prestige by the description of his own property.

“ Conciliation Hall was packed to suffocation.
When O’Connell arose, flaming with anger, the
audience were prepared for invective. Nor were they
disappointed. O’Connell soared into the empyrean of
abuse. He assailed this ‘ villain father of lies ’ with
every injurious adjective in his vast vocabulary ; and
at the end of a prolonged outburst of imprecations, he
stamped the whole narrative as ‘ the baseless falsehood
of a malignant hireling of the infamous Times' As
this seemed to be a challenge to test the truth of
Foster’s statements, I received one morning a letter
in the handwriting with which I was now tolerably
familiar, requesting me to proceed to Ennis (I think),
to meet Mr. Foster, to accompany him to Derrynane,
to go over the estate and write -an account of what I
saw, without any reference to Mr. Foster or his letter
which, au reste, I had not read. Mr. Maurice O’Connell
would meet us, and conduct us over the estate.

“ Accordingly, I went and saw the place, and found
that no partisanship could overpaint the truth.
Derrynanebeg was an outrage on civilisation — cabins
reeking with fever-exhalations ; pigs, poultry, cattle,
standing deep in oozy slough; the rafters dripping
with smoky slime ; children all but naked ; women and
men in rags. Mr. O’Connell presented the people
and their dwellings with such an air of contentment
that he really seemed to show them off as rather a

f ood average peasantry and affair specimen of an
rish village. I was horrified with all I saw. Foster,
moodily watching in silence, picking his way from
stone to stone in the rude causeway bordered with
manure heaps and foul green ponds that led_ to
the apertures which served as doorways, awaited
the verdict. And there was Maurice O’Connell, a
Christian gentleman, well educated, charitable, kind-
hearted, his feelings blunted by familiarity with the
filth and unutterable squalor of the place, talking
Irish to the boys and colleens, who laughed at his
jokes as if they were at a fair or a wedding. I believe

i> — icrrtT

n

34

THE REPEAL AGITATION [Chap. III.

the tenants of Derrynanebeg were squatters, the
evicted refuse of adjoining estates, who flocked to the
boggy valley, where they were allowed to run up their
hovels of soddened earth and mud, with leave to turn
out their lean kine and cultivate patches of potatoes
on the hillside, paying as many shillings as the agent
could squeeze out of them.

“The inspection over we went up to the Abbey,
where a bounteous luncheon was spread for us.
Foster would not break bread or touch a drop of
the wine so warmly commended by his host. I was
younger — and I was hungry and thirsty. I did not
see any reason why I should starve and need drink ;
and so it was that at the meeting of the Repeal
Association the following week, in a letter from
Maurice O’Connell which was read by his father, I was
described as a very agreeable young fellow with a fine
appetite and a good taste in claret, while Foster was
called an ‘ ill-bred boor.’ However, my qualities did not
serve me when the ‘ Liberator ’ came to deal with my
letter. At one of his meetings he gave me a look which
prepared me for the wrath to come. The storm of
words stirred me less than the furious glances of the
raging women in the galleries. Indeed, had 1 dared,
I could have laughed when O’Connell compared
Foster and me to quacks at a fair, an old one and a
young one. 'The old one declares; “With this
remedy I cured the King of France of the falling
sickness.” “My father speaks the truth,” says the
young quack. “ Here’s a pill that taken once a day
cured the Emperor of China of a broken leg so that he
can run now like a lamplighter.” “ I swear to that,”
says the other ; “ I saw it myself.” The Times sends
liar Foster oyer here to blacken my character as a
landlord. I hurl back my defiance and_ the Times
finds liar Russell — I don’t know who he is, but I am
told he is an Irishman (groans) — to back up Foster.
You have seen quacks at a fair, haven't you? Liar
number two says, “My father speaks the truth.”
Foster calls upon liar Russell to corroborate him, and
there are two liars instead of one 1 Just to let you have
an idea what sort of a mendacious miscreant this fellow
with the fine appetite and the nice taste in claret is,

THE “IRISH SOCIETY”

35

184s]

let me tell you that he actually writes that there is not
a pane of g'lass in Derrynane 1 I wish he had as
many pains m his stomach ! ’

“ I wrote what was the fact, that there was not a
pane of glass in the village of Derrynane. O’Connell
gave the meeting to understand that I declared that
there was not a pane in the Abbey windows.

“There was a short-lived attempt to found an
Association for the amicable Union of Irishmen,
promoted by the Repeal Members of the Erechtheum
under the title of the ‘ Irish Society.’ In connection
with it there was a very pleasant dinner at the ' Star
and Garter’ with O’Connell in the chair. It was a
glorious evening, and the setting sun cast a radiance
over stream and mead. The Liberator, with his arms
folded, surveyed the scene for a short time in silence,
and then turning to the company exclaimed, ‘ Men of
Ireland, this is a country worth fighting for.’ Before
we sat down the secretary, Mr. Condon, was requested
to read the answer of the Duke of Wellington to a
letter inviting him to be present at the opening banquet.
The Duke wrote: — ‘F.M. the Duke of Wellington
has received a letter signed H. Condon asking him to
dinner with the Irish Society. F.M. the Duke of
Wellington rarely dines out, and never with people he
does not know.’ ”

CHAPTER IV
THE TRIAL OF O’CONNELL

Russell had not been long in Ireland in the autumn
of 1843 when he received his first hint that the
Government meant to strike, and to strike hard,
against the Repeal Agitation. A young man named
Stephen Elrington, son of a former Provost of Trinity
College, was principal reporter to Saunders' News
Letter* and was also connected with the Dublin
Evening Mail; he it was who remarked to Russell
with a significance which was afterwards vividly
appreciated, “I would not advise you to attend the
Repeal demonstration on Sunday at Clontarf.” " But
I must be there, my good man," said Russell “ You
know what I am over here for, don’t you? " “Yes,”
was the answer ; " but you will hear news that will
astonish you— and others too, before long.” The
meeting was to take place on October sth, at Clontarf,
where Brian Boroimhe won his famous victory over
the Danish invaders.

“ The selection of the spot,” Russell writes,t “ was
significant. Clontarf is a suburb of Dublin, and the
battle itself was regarded as in some way connected
with a triumph which was to be achieved over the
Saxons. On October 4th, the Lord Lieutenant issued
a proclamation forbidding the meeting. A great

* It was on the evidence of a reporter of Sautiiers' Nms Letter that
O’Connell was arrested for having said, “ If Ireland were driven mad
by persecution, she would find, like South America, another Bolivar."
The grand jury, however, threw out the bill.

t The following narrative, taken from the autobiography, was
published in the Anti-Jaeobin, February aist, 1891.

37

1843] THE CLONTARF MEETING

display of military force was made early the following
morning, but it was with difficulty that the crowds
of people and the processions on their way to
the meeting were induced to go home. When the
troops had fallen in and marched off to barracks, I
was glad to go to the nearest hostelry, where there
was a rough (very) and ‘ read}^ ’ ordinary. A gloomy
company of Kepealers were discussing the coup. ‘ I
say Danny’s done for,’ said one. ‘ Just wait and see.
I’ll back him yet,’ said another. Presently a gentleman
at the table nammered it with his knife, ‘1 propose
that the friends of Ireland and Liberty adjourn to the
“ Harp ” where Pat Shanahan is presiding at a meeting
to consider what we'll do with those murderous
ruffians at the Castle.’ I resolved to finish my day
heroically, and trudged down Sackville Street to the
‘ Harp.’

“There was a large attendance, mostly of coal-
porters; the chairman was on his legs dealing with
the situation — ‘and if the villains dare to touch one
hair of the sacred head of O’Connell — ’ ‘ Of his wig,’
exclaimed a voice. ‘ Turn him out.’ ‘ Kick him into
the street,’ shouted twenty furious throats. I was
much relieved when Stephen Elrington’s brother was
ejected by angry patriots, and Mr. Shanahan continued,
‘ I was saying when I was interrupted by that drunken
spalpeen, if they dare to touch a hair of the sacred
head of O’Connell, let us like the Indian warriors of
old, bury our hollyhocks (sic) in the earth and raise
the war-cry of our nation.’ In the general applause
accorded to that sentiment, I made my way to the
street. Yes, Dan was done — Frappez fort et frappez
vite was the motto of the Peel and Wellington
Cabinet.*

“ Once resolved, there was no hesitation on the part
of the Government. On the 14th, Daniel O’Connell,
his son Jbhn, and five of his supporters were held to
bail at the police court to answer charges brought
against them by the Attorney-General. On Novem-
ber 8th, at the beginning; of the Michaelmas term, a
true bill was found against them. They were called
upon to plead within four days ; but before the term

* The Duke of Wellington had poured 35,000 men into Ireland.

38 THE TRIAL OF O’CONNELL [Chap. IV.

elapsed they put in a plea of abatement, and after
much legal argument the Court decided against them.
The trial of the traversers, as they were called, was
fixed for January isth.

“ Great preparations were made for reporting the
trial. Special corps of reporters were sent over by
the leading London journals. The Morning Herald
dispatched a clipper steam yacht to Kingstown ; and
the Times engaged the /row Duke, a virgin steamer
of the City of Dublin Company, of unequalled speed.
Never was there a larger or longer display of black-
letter learning than there was at these trials —
arguments on ‘captions of indictments,’ 'respondeat
ouster,' etc. — and never perhaps were there more
elaborate speeches. Two among them were probably
as brilliant as any ever heard in any Court — Whiteside’s
and Sheil’s. The first was the work of a great orator,
delivered in the finest manner ; it was sarcastic, witty,
humorous, indignant and pathetic by turns, and having
heard it, I never could understand how or why
Whiteside failed in the House of Commons. Sheil’s
squeaky voice marred to a great extent the cfifect of
his highly-wrought and rather poetical argument ; but
the fact that I had in my pocket the MS. of his speech,
discounted greatly more than his shrill tones did, in my
case, the force of his moving appeal, and spoiled the
ornate peroration of which after all he forgot the best
morsel.

“ One of the few bons mots in connection with the
trial, that I can remember, was made by William
Keogh when there was some discussion respecting
the chances the traversers had of getting a fair jury.
‘ I suppose,’ said Robert Russell, ‘ there will be some
colourable appearance of fairness on the panel ; there
must be some of the Catholic element on it.’ ‘ Oh,’
quoth Keogh, ‘ You may depend on it that it will all
be dissolved in an Orange solution by the power of
Chemistry.’ Kemmis was the name of the Clerk of
the Crown.

“The proceedings lasted three-and-twenty days.
I am persuaded that there was no one in Court who
had any doubt of the result. Nevertheless the jury
did not by any means decide in haste. The judges

1844]

THE VERDICT

39

rose at five o’clock, leaving Mr. Justice Crampton to
take the verdict. After the charge (one of the longest
and ablest ever heard) was over, the jury retired, and
remained out for hours, coming in occasionally to ask
questions. I was very hungry and stole off to get
something to eat at nine o’clock, leaving messengers
to report any event in Court. The square and the
quays outside the Four Courts were tnronged with .
a multitude awaiting the verdict. Judges, counsel,
reporters, audience, were making the best of their
time to eat and drink, if not to be merry, and cars
were in readiness to take them back from their houses
or taverns the moment the jury sent to announce they
were ready.

“ The Court was nearly deserted. There were some
men in the seats behind the bar, and groups of women
who had never moved since the judges took their seats
on the bench, a few of the junior bar were watching for
their absent leaders, and one or two of the seniors
nodding in the Queen's Counsel’s row as if to keep
in countenance the officers of the Court, who were
dozing in their seats below the deserted bench, but
in the great hall there was a crowd awaiting the deci-
sion. Many thought there would be no verdict. They
were not aware that the jury was composed of men
whose views were well known to Mr. Kemmis.
Suddenly I was called into Court. The jury were
coming in.”

The verdict, of course, was “ Guilty,” but sentence
was reserved, and it was not till May 30th that
O’Connell was condemned to twelve months’ imprison-
ment and a fine of £2,000.

“ I was in utrumque paratus," continues Russell.
“ The special train was ready at Westland Row. The
Iron Dukevj 3.5 lying at her buoy in Kingston Harbour,
with steam up. At Holyhead the locomotive and
carriage were prepared for the run to London. At
Westland Row there was a delay. The stationmaster
had given up any expectation of the train being needed.
The steam was blown off, the engineer had gone off to
sleep or beer, but at last the express rattled out of the

40 THE TRIAL OF O’CONNELL [Chap. IV.

dirty suburb, and the whistles of the engine were soon
disturbing the curlew on the shore at Booterstown.
I stepped out on the platform at Kingstown with all
my baggage, a large notebook full of caricatures and
facetice, notes and observations, and a light overcoat in
my hand. There was no one to receive me at the
station, and no boat at the stairs ; but one of the police
on the quay showed me the lights of the Iron Duke.
The harbour was soon vocal with that name, ‘ Iron
Duke,' and many ‘ Ahoys ! ’ till just as I sank into
hoarse silence a lantern was waved over the counter
and an ‘ Aye, aye ’ came shorewards over the water.
Presently a boat came off for me, and as I stepped on
the deck of the steamer I was received with the remark,
‘ We gave you up after midnight, and banked up, but
will be off in less than half an hour.’ One way or
another an hour was lost ere we left Kingstown
harbour ; but the Iron Duke made a rapid run across
the Channel, and in a few minutes after landing I was
on_my way to London, the bearer of exclusive news to
Printing House Square

“ I had been sitting all day and night in boots inclined
to tightness ; I was very tired, and as I tried to get a
little sleep in the train, I kicked them off with some
difficulty. I was awakened by a voice in my ear.
‘Jump out, sir! The cab is waiting — not a minute
to lose.’ We were at Euston. The man who spoke
was the Times office messenger. He saw my boots
on the floor of the carriage, ‘You get in and put
thein on in the cab. They’re in a dreadful state
waiting at the office 1 ’ How I did struggle with those
boots I It is a most difficult thing to put on a boot
in a cab in motion, but I persevered, and got one on
in less than half an hour. Then the vehicle stopped
in a small square of houses, one side of which was
a blaze of lights from top to bottom. The messenger
opened the cab door. ‘ i’ll tell the editor you’ve come,'
said he, and vanished through the door, outside which
stood some men in their shirt-sleeves. As I alighted
one of them said in my ear, ‘We are glad to hear
they’ve found O’Connell guilty at last.^ I did not
reflect ; I thought it was one of the office people, and
answered, ‘Oh, yes I All guilty, but on different

RUSSELL TRICKED

41

1844]

counts.’ And then, with one boot under my arm and
my coat over it, I entered the ofiSce.

There I was met by the messenger. ‘ This w^, sir.
Mr. Delane is waiting for you. This way.’ There
were printers at counters in the long room which I
now entered, and as I hurried along I was aware that
every one of them had his eye on my bootless foot and
its white stocking. I passed out of the office through a
short corridor. The door of the editor’s room opened,
and I made my bow to the man who had so much to
say to the leaps and bounds by which the Times had
become the leading journal of England. I remember
him vividly as he sat there : a broad-shouldered man
with a massive head and chin, square jaws, large full-
lipped firm mouth, and keen, light, luminous eyes,
lie was shading his face with his hand from the lamp.
His first words were, ‘Not an accident, I hope?’ as
he glanced at the unfortunate foot. ‘No, sir.’ ‘Is it
all written out ? ’ I handed him my narrative. ‘Tell

Mr. to let me have the slips as fast as he can!

Now tell me all about the verdict’ And he listened
intently. The first slip interrupted us; then came a
second, and a third, and so on, till I sank to sleep in
my chair. I was awakened by a hand on my shoulder.
The room was empty : onj^ my friend the messenger.
The clock marked 4.20. There was an hotel in Fleet
Street to which my guardian messenger sent off a
printer’s devil to order a room, and to it I drove with
my overcoat and boot pour tout butin, and slept till
noon next day.

“ My waking was not pleasant. A fiery note from
the manager: ‘You managed very badly. The
Morning Herald has got the verdict 1 This must be
inquired into I ’

“ It turned out that my pleasant interlocutor at the
entrance to the office was an emissary of the enemy.
By artful and audacious guesses, the hated rival was
able to make a fair announcement on Monday morning
of the result of the great O’Connell trials I It was
very mortifying, for there was intense rivalry between
the Montagues and Capulets of the Press. The
Morning Herald had been running a hard race with
the Thunderer, especially in the matter of Indian

42

THE TRIAL OF O’CONNELL [Chap. IV.

expresses, and the rising flood of railway enterprise
carried with it the golden sands of advertisement, for
which there was keen competition. I went to Printing
House Square as soon as I could repair damages, and
was received by Delane p'ere, the manager. I answered
the questions he put— as to whom I had spoken with at
Holyhead— as to whom I saw at the stations where
we stopped, guards or porters, etc., till 1 arrived at
the office. Then I related the little incident at the
door, I could not describe the men in shirt-sleeves
or say exactly how many they were, or be certain
whether the owner of the voice was one of them, or
if he was in his shirt-sleeves. Delanc thumped the
table. ‘ The confounded miscreants ! But it was sharp
of them ! And now, my young friend, let me give you
a piece of advice. As you have very nearly severed
your connection with us by your indiscretion, and
as you are likely, if you never repeat it, to be in our
service, let me warn you to keep your lips closed and
your eyes open. Never speak about your business.
Commit it to paper for the editor, and for him alone.
We would have given hundreds of pounds to have
stopped your few words last night.’ ”

Of course Russell was crestfallen, but a pretty note
from the editor speedily restored his spirits. He
returned to Dublin to be present in the Queenis Bench
Court on May 30th, when the conviction of O’Connell
and his staff was confirmed and judgment was delivered.
As he was leaving the Court Isaac Butt took him by
the sleeve and said, “ Mark my words. The House
of Lords will reverse that decision. You know what
my political opinions are, and so will do me the
justice to believe that I have no forensic passion in
the matter. But you must not quote me. Govern-
ment will never quell the feeling of this people, and
unless it kills them some concession must be made.”
Russell adds in his diary : —

“ I was greatly surprised. Up to that time I had
always looked on Butt as a No Surrender man,

1843] O’CONNELL’S GENIALITY 43

a Protestant champion, and believed that he carried
a dagger up his sleeve to defend his life against his
enemies.”

Butt’s prophecy was, of course, fulfilled. An appeal
on a writ of error to the House of Lords succeeded,
and on September 4th the Irish judgment was
reversed.

Before leaving the subject of O'Connell it is right
to look back a little and record a genial act of
the Liberator towards Russell, who expresses his
gratitude in these words : —

“ On my way back from a monster meeting near
Athlone to make my way to Dublin and catch the
mail boat for London, the wretched old vehicle in
which I was travelling broke down, and it was with
difficulty I got as far as Ally Gray’s Hotel, at Athlone.
Whilst there, waiting for any coach or car that could
be found, the Liberator, followed by a cheering crowd,
made his appearance and walked into the room.

‘ What I Mr. Russell I The Times behindhand ? That
is terrible.’ I told him what had happened, and
without a moment’s hesitation O’Connell said, ‘ I will
give you a seat in my carriage — Tom Steele* will go
outside, though he is safer when I have my eye
on him. What do you say ? ’ It was my only chance.
I accepted it, and in ten minutes more I was in the
comfortable carriage seated side by side with the man
of whose exceedingly vigorous vituperation against
the Government in England and in Ireland, against
the Times and all belonging to it, I had copious notes
in my pocket. It was a very interesting journey ;
one perpetual hurray from the fields, from the streets
mile after mile; men, women, and children cutting
turf and digging potatoes — ^no matter what they were
doing — rushed off to the roadside to see O’Connell and
to cheer for Repeal ; priests and fanners in every town

This Protestant landlord, who spent his fortune in the cause of
Eepeal, was appointed by O’Connell to the majestic position of
“ Head Pacificator.” He was tried with O’Connell in 1844.

44 THE TRIAL OF O’CONNELL [Chap. IV.

thronged round the coach if it halted for a moment to
shake hands with him, and when we got to Dublin
too late to think of getting to Kingstown for the mail
boat, O’Connell said, ‘ Now, come in to dinner. You
can do nothing more. You won’t mind our coach-
load sitting down without dressing for it after we
have washed our hands.’ And it was a very pleasant
and excellent dinner, though I was a veritable fly
in the amber to company. Two of them were sons of
the Liberator, and mere was Tom Steele, who made
up for compulsory abstinence on the journey. More
than once did 1 think of the effect a vision of my
company, and of the locality where I was spending
the evening, would have in Printing House Square ! ”

On his return to London after this mission Russell
moved into chambers at No. i. New Court, Middle
Temple. The memories he associated with these
chambers were chiefly of evening parties furnished
by Prosser and enjoyed unreservedly. Oysters, he
declares, were only eightpence a dozen, a giant crab
cost one shilling, the most noble of lobsters could be
had for twice as much. Delane, the editor of the Times,
used to send him tickets for the theatres, and he also
became a frequenter of the Opera Plouse in the Hay-
market. There, for three shillings, he heard the music
very well and “ saw a little of the singers.” In old age he
used to contrast the Opera House as it appeared then
with the modern Opera in Covent Garden. He used
to speak of Fop’s Alley, with its “best men about
Town”— Cantelupe, D’Orsay, Cecil Forester, Jim
Macdonald, F. Gordon and their cohorts — and the
Crush Room, “ where,” said the O’Mulligan to
Thackeray, perceiving that there was a Neapolitan
finality of splendour in the place, “ I declare to mee
goodness. I’d like to die on the spot.” But of all
his reminiscences of the Opera in the forties Russell

VERDI’S "ERNANI”

1844]

45

liked most to tell of his first and last performance as
a musical critic : —

“ One evening,” he writes in his autobiography,
“ as I was walking back to my chambers from dinner,
Francis, who was a well-known personage on the
Press at the time, came across the court, and ‘after
compliments,’ asked me if I could go to the opera for
him the next night. ‘ For,’ said he, ‘ I want very
much to get out of town early to-morrow, and it will
oblige me very much if you can take my box and
write a small notice of a new opera by a composer
named Verdi, quite unknown here, and very noisy
and extravagant. I wonder how Lumley can be such
a fool. The subject of the opera is Hernani, Victor
Hugo’s play. But you need not do more than give

the plot and note the impression and ’ ‘ But,'

quoth I, interrupting, ‘ I don’t understand one word
of music.’ ‘ My dear fellow, it’s not necessary ; I don’t
either. You must express no opinion. You will have
the libretto, and you can mark what is applauded and
what is not, and “ reserve a detailed criticism for
another occasion.” Above all things avoid enthusiasm
or praise.’ It pleased and amused me to become a
musical critic all at once; my scruples were easily
allayed, and next night I found myself in the Francis
box with my future brother-in-law, who had, if
nothing else, a wonderful ear for music. The house
was crammed, and when the orchestra began the
overture I heard a critic in the next box say to his
fellows, ‘Now for the fiasco.’ But it was no fiasco,
though it was J. W. Davidson who spoke ; and when
the curtain drew up there were actually some slight
sounds of applause m the pit and galleries, and these
manifestations spread all over the house ere the “ tutto
sprezzo che d'Emani" was reached and greeted with
distinct enthusiasm. The “ vieni meco sol di rosa ” and
“ involami Emani" were also much applauded, and
the curtain fell in the last scene on an unmistakable
success. The critics were taken aback. They talked
of a claque, of a packed house, etc. All the way to
the Temple my companion in rapture kept humming
bits of the airs ; talked of magnificent ensemble and

46 THE TRIAL OF O’CONNELL [Chap. IV.

chords and so forth, and when we reached my rooms
he seized the libretto profusely marked. As I wrote
he whistled the airs, and I finished a highly eulogistic
notice of ' Ernani ’ in an hour and hurried off to the
Observer office with it.

“ I read it next day (Sunday) with immense satis-
faction and thought a good deal of myself, but my
satisfaction only endured for the day and sorrow
came in the morning. It was in the form of Francis,
who rushed in on me on Monday just as 1 was turning
out for a pull on the river from Temple Stairs. ‘ You
have ruined me,’ he gasped. ‘ How ? What is the
matter?’ ‘Matter I Have you seen the morning
papers?’ (No, not yet. What is there in them?’
‘Well, nothing but damnation for that rubbish that
you have praised up hill and down dale. I entreated
you not to express any opinion or indulge in musical
criticism, and you promised you would not ! The
editor of the Observer has sent for me — of course to
know how the thing occurred ; and 1 shall probably
lose my engagement. I really am surprised at you ! ’
‘ But,’ said 1, ‘ young Burrowes, who is a capital
musician, thinks quite differently ! ’ ‘ Y oung Burrowes
be hanged! ’ And he bounded oft' in a rage. But the
Observer was, as far as I know, the only London
newspaper that had a word of prai.sc — gcxKl and
strong, too — for the first opera of Verdi performed
in London ; and it was with immense pride and
exultation I marked the Press change to my side and,
at last, with reason for the faith that was in them,
give praise to ‘ Ernani ’ as a work of genius, admirable
in melody, instrumentation and originality.”

CHAPTER V

THE RAILWAY MANIA

Among the many friends Russell had made in Ireland
was Mr. Peter Burrowes, who had been Purse-Bearer
to Lord Plunket, the Lord Chancellor of Ireland. He
was the only son of an eminent lawyer, also named
Peter Burrowes, whose eloquence and ability had
placed him in the first rank of his time. Peter
Burrowes p'ere had been a staunch adherent of Grattan,
and, being a member of the Irish Parliament, had
opposed the Government whenever proposals for
union were under consideration, with the utmost
determination. After the last fatal division Burrowes
posted off to Tinnehinch, where Grattan was lying ill
from an attack of gout, and, dashing into his friend’s
room in the early morning, told him that all was over.
“We shall be avenged, Peter,” exclaimed Grattan,
“and it will be a terrible vengeance. We shall send
three hundred ruffians into their House of Commons,
who will destroy their Parliament.” Burrowes lived
long enough to see the triumph of Catholic Emancipa-
tion, and when the measure for the relief of insolvent
debtors for Ireland was passed, he and his old friend
Parsons were the first judges appointed in Ireland. At
the opening of the Court Burrowes said, “ Brother
Parsons, you and I are the first people to take the
benefit of the Act in Ireland, at all events ! ”

“ I became intimate,” writes Russell, “ with the family
of this man’s son, and at the charming house in Leeson
Street I made the acquaintance of two daughters of

48 THE RAILWAY MANIA [Chap. V.

Judge Burrowes’ nephew. I became engaged to one
of these, Mary Burrowes, and the strangest thing of
all was that the relations and friends of the lady who
was willing to link her fate with mine did not set their
faces resolutely against such a wild and ill-considered
match. On the appearance of my name in association
with that of Campbell Foster in the visit to Derrynane,
O'Connell’s estate, one of the relations of Mr. Peter
Burrowes expressed great displeasure. He wrote to
the Liberator, who was a friend of his, to assure him
of his indignation that these mercenary correspondents
were admitted into the society of respectable people.”

“ Mr. Burrowes," Russell goes on, “ was one of the
many members of the Irish Bar who resented as an
outrage the anointment of Sir John Campbell, after-
wards Lord Campbell, to be Lord Chancellor in
succession to Lord Plunket* When Lord Campbell
took his seat for the first time in the Four Courts he
was received without any enthusiasm, and in the course
of the ordinary business he said, addressing the counsel
who was opening some case, ‘ I may remark that it is
the custom in English Courts when counsel are
addressing the judge to rise and to remain standing
whilst they are doing so. The learned counsel seems
to me to be sitting down.' The fact was that the
gentleman who was speaking was of extraordinary
shortness of limb and was generally known as ‘ Tom
Tit.’ A titter ran through the Court when the little
barrister blurted out, ‘ I beg your lordship’s pardon, I
am standing as high as I can, and would not dare to
address your lordship otherwise.’ ’’

This was a reverse to the dignity of the new Lord
Chancellor, but he was determined at all costs to
enforce English practices in the Irish Courts. Not
very long afterwards he was struck by the appearance
of a barrister who was not addressing the Court, but
was, nevertheless, standing up very much at his ease.

“Looking at the row of counsel among which the
delinquent was standing," writes Russell, “ Lord

* In 1841. He held the Chancellorship about six weeks, and sat
in Court only a few times.

LORD CAMPBELL

49

1841]

Campbell remarked, ' I may observe that it is not
usual for counsel to stand up in Court when he is
not addressing the judge, and I see one learned counsel
who is doing so. Perhaps he is about to speak ? ’
Whereupon the counsel, who was singularly long in
the back, exclaimed, ‘ If your lordship alludes to me I
wish to say that I am not infringing the universal
practice in Court, as I am sitting down.’ At which
Lord Campbell threw up his hands with an expression
of surprise and remarked, ‘ I beg your pardon. I never
thought it for a moment.’ ”

Now that Russell was engaged to be married he had
a greater incentive than ever to make his way at the
Bar, or to find for himself a secure place in journalism.
To quote his own words, " Twenty-three (myself) said
to Nineteen (my fiancee), ‘Had we not better wait?’
And Nineteen answered, ‘Yes, by all means, if we
must.’ ” Hesitating caution of that kind is a sure sign
that the young people will be incautious, after all.
Russell liked reporting the debates in the House of
Commons, but it was the only employment which he
could look upon as at all regular. Sessions were not
so long then as in these days, and the work was far
from filling up all his time. In fine, his appointment
did not provide him with a justification for marriage.

Describing his duties in the Press Gallery, he
writes : —

“The gentlemen who reported for the principal
London papers in Parliament were men of culture who
were glad to devote part of their time to this service
for the Times, Morning Herald, Morning Chronicle, and
Morning Post, for they were thus enabled to keep their
terms at the Inns of Court or study for some liberal
profession. A good many of them were barristers in
practice — ^when they could get it — and some newspaper
offices could show the names of Lord Campbell,
Serjeant Talfourd, Serjeant Shee, Dickens, and others

R. — VOL. I. E

so THE RAILWAY MANIA [Chap. V.

on the desks where they had sat when writing out
their notes.”

Fortunately in the next year, 1845, work not less
important and certainly more exciting fell into
Russell’s hands when he assisted in the proceedings,
stormy and, as he thought, often ungenerous, which
led to the dethronement of George Hudson, the so-
called Railway King. A few days before the sitting
of the Sub-Committees to report on the preamble of
the numerous railway bills. Delane sent for him to
come to his room, and after a few questions as to his
studies for the Bar, he said, “ Now, Mr. Russell, I am
going to put you at the head of the whole of our Rail-
way Committees Staff of Reporters. You must look
after the gentlemen and see they do their work. You
will have only one Committee to attend personally.
You are to read the copy of the other reporters and
exercise unlimited and merciless power in dealing with
it, suppressing all suspicious adjectives and all state-
ments not connected with actual fact. Here is a list
of your colleagues and their addresses. You will
receive every evening a programme of the business
before the Sub-Committees. The cashier has orders to
pay you a suitable addition to your salary while you
are charged with this work and you will have due
notice of the meetings of your staff here so as to
arrange with them before the Sub-Committees begin
their sittings.”

Russell writes : —

" I departed overwhelmed. There was happily a
little breathing time before the Sub-Committees on
standing orders were constituted, and I could arrange
with my colleagues, one of whom was my dear and
lamented friend John MacDonald, who succeeded
Mowbray Morris many years afterwards as manager

1 845] THE WORK OF THE COMMITTEES 51

of the Times. When the private bills business came
on the work was awful. The representatives of the
Press who now attend Parliament can have no idea of
the inconvenience to which their predecessors were
exposed in the temporary buildings erected while the
Palace was in course of erection after the great fire.
The members of the Sub-Committees were miserably
accommodated. I have seen the rain streaming in on
their honourable heads, and also on the tables at which
they were seated in the wooden sheds told off for the
sittings. The mania* was at its height before Easter,
The corridors, the lobbies, and approaches to the
Committee rooms were thronged with a crowd of
promoters, witnesses, parliamentary agents, solicitors,
engineers, traffic takers. The sheds were packed to
suffocation. Counsel who had reputation for skill in
private bills business commanded whatever fees they
or their clerks asked. ‘ Hurrah ! We’ve got Hope,'
shouted one agent. ‘ Very well, we’ve got Wrangham
and Austin, ’ cried another. Smaller men than these, the
Pagets, Kinglakes, Jameses, and so forth, made fortunes.
The influence of the railway gamble was felt all over the
country ; none was too great to be indifferent. To me
the whole of this railway world was new and strange.
I had no knowledge of the nature of the opera-
tions of the brokers or of the mysteries of the
Stock Exchange, nor for many a long day did I under-
stand the working of the machine, though I heard
little else talked of by those around me. What was
true of the rest of the world applied to the Press.
Proprietors, editors, and staff were dabbling in shares,
letters of allotment, etc. The newspapers coined
money from railway advertisements. I do not forget
the look of incredulous supriseofMr. Coates, a pleasant
bustling Parliamentary agent, when, in answer to his
enquiry, ‘ How do you feel ? ’ after the decision of the
House in Group X, I told him, ‘ I don’t care twopence
about it ? ’ This Group X was my especial charge.
There were days and days spent in discussing the
banks of the River Witham — ^whether they would bear
a rail or not. I said it was the rustic’s stream, ‘ lahitur

* There were over twelve hundred rival schemes, and attempts
were made to raise over ;^5oo,ooo,ooo.

52

THE RAILWAY MANIA [Chap. V.

ac labetur, tn omne mlubilis aevum.’ In sheer ennui I
ridiculed witnesses and counsel without the least notion,
till I heard it naany months afterwards, that 1 was sus-
pected by the other side of bein^ paid and bought.

“ There was a great battle in my room between
various companies — a railway Armageddon — and for
fourteen weeks, from April 28th to August 5th, hosts
of counsel, agents, and witnesses strove before Lord
Courtney and his fellows to prove their preambles and
their datum lines. The datum referred to the heights,
depths, cuttings, tunnels, and embankments, and the
battle was fought on each with extraordinary ingenuity
and skill. If an error could be established at any
point in the survey of the line the datum was vitiated
and the preamble was in danger. Then, again, there
was the traffic question, as to which there were pro-
longed contests between traffic takers and counsel.
Sometimes a witness would give figures as to men,
carriages, and horses, cattle, etc., in a certain area
showing that the proposed railway was of the first
necessity. Then, haply, some learned gentleman would
elicit the fact that the figures were taken on a fair or
market day. One gentleman, then young, one of the
great engineers of our day, was a terror to the best
experts in wig and gown ; he was never put out or
flurried — always slow, always sure. He would meet
some indignant interrogatory, ‘ You mean to tell the
committee, Mr. Fowler, that you seriously say,’ etc.,
with a quiet ‘Certainly, and Iwill prove it, too.’ He
had a very disconcerting habit of looking in a half-
pitying, half-triumphant manner at the chairman and
members when counsel put questions to him as though
he would say, ‘You hear what he says, poor man?
Now listen and hear how I will crush him.’ When the
bills were ripe for the Committee stage the war became
political, and the second readings of them were events
of importance in the eye of the Opposition and of
Ministers. For myself, I was concerned chiefly with
the handsome emoluments which depended on the
duration of the business of which I had charge.”

Russell’s statement that Group X was his “ especial
charge” gives, it must be confessed, an especial

THE RAILWAY KING

53

184s]

meaning to a letter from Delane from which it appears
that Russell’s arrangements were temporarily dis-
approved because he had at first delegated the
reporting in Group X to another hand and brain.
“ You have been unfortunate,” writes Delane, in his
terse antithetic manner “ in entrusting the most
important of the Committees to the worst man. Pray
attend it in future yourself, and let it have a larger
report and closer attention than any of the others.”

Russell was introduced by an old college friend
to George Hudson, the Railway King, and soon after-
wards he was invited to dine at Albert Gate at the
house which is now the French Embassy.

“ It was the year before the crash,” he writes ; “ there
was an immense party, royal personages, dukes auid
peers of lower degree, great ladies, statesmen, finan-
ciers, and a heavy tedious dinner. After that I dined
several times within the year with Mr. Hudson and
wondered why I was so much favoured. One night
en petit comit'e, the Railway King said : ‘ Will you tell
us why you were so down m the Times on the
Cambridge and Lincoln in Group X ? I was told you
had a large interest to support there. Cusack Rowney
was ready to bid.’ I answered : ‘ If anyone told you
I had an interest to the extent of one shilling in that
or any other railway in Group _X, he told you what
was untrue.’ ‘Dear me,’ he said, ‘is that so! I am
very sorry to hear it, for your sake.’ ”

All through his life, it may be said here, Russell
perceived that the Press offered him a simple alter-
native between honesty and dishonesty. In the early
part of his career he was irresponsible enough, to be
sure, and his opinions were not fixed. He has spoken
of himself as “ a mercenary ” at this time of his life.
But even then he recognised that there is a very clear
line beyond which an honest man cannot go in his
compliance ; he must never confuse public and private

54

THE RAILWAY MANIA [Chap. V.

interests. That is the essential condition of the
reputable journalisra of public affairs. One of the
greatest sorrows of Russell’s life, as we shall see
later, was that he was once suspected by men whose
good opinion he valued of having violated this salutary
and indeed indispensable rule. The vulgarity of the
Railway King and the Parliamentary agent mentioned
before, and their ignorance of the motives of men
outside their own world, would have been proved by
their assumption of Russell’s complicity (and much
more by Hudson’s gratuitous regret at finding that
complicity did not exist) if it had never been proved
by anything else.

The " railway mania ” did not occupy Russell’s time
continuously nor, we may guess, did it ever wholly
occupy his mind. A journalist has no manias. He
did anything and everything which he was instructed to
do ; though he did everything well when he liked, there
are signs that his high spirits sometimes got the better
of his industry and discretion. Thus Delane wrote to
him once on the occasion of an important bye-election :

“The Times Office.

“ Dear Sir, — It is with great regret that I have seen
the very meagre report you have given of the Middlesex
Election, and that I have heard of your absenting
yourself on the most important day. No single contest
has excited greater interest, ancl I thought that in
assigning the duty of reporting it to you, I was pro-
viding for the paper the best account which could be
obtained of the election and all its attendant circum-
stances. I grieve to add that I have been disappointed
throughout. I enclose a card of admission to the
hustings on Friday, and have to request that you will
attend and prepare a full report.

“ I am,

“Yours faithfully,

“John T. Delane.’’

1845]

A RAILWAY ACCIDENT

55

Russell was returning from one of the anti-Hudson
meetings at York when the train came into collision
near Leicester, and he received a severe wound across
the forehead, which was cut to the bone. Next day a
surgeon, sent by the railway company, came to see
him and instructed him to keep quiet. Soon after-
wards another visitor on behalf of the company sent
in his card. He was admitted and declared himself
delighted at seeing Russell looking so well, as he had
been told he was injured. 'Still, the company are
distressed to know you have received any injury at all,
and I have been sent round with a cheque for
useful I hope, for a little holiday.’ The money was
very welcome to Russell, and he signed the wordy
receipt which his visitor produced as ‘ a mere matter of
form.’ The next day one of his friends, Durrant
Cooper, came, and Russell told him what had occurred.
He jumped off his chair ; ‘ What, for that injury 1
By Heavens, I would not have taken ;^Soo or £yso for
it ! What an opportunity thrown away I The jurors are
all giving it hot to these railway companies I ”

As the work Russell did during the railway mania
dwindled, a new ray of light fell on the engaged
couple. It turned out to be rather an ignis fatuus, but
they could not foresee that, and it was cheering enough
to hearts which required small excuses for cheer-
fulness. Robert Russell wrote to say that a syndicate
of rich men was about to start a daily paper to be
edited by Charles Dickens. Robert Russell himself
had already left the Times to join this new paper, the
Daily News, and he asked Russell if he would accept
an engagement. Almost at the same time a letter
came from the manager of the Morning Chronicle to
inquire if Russell would join his staff, and proposing

56

THE RAILWAY MANIA [Chap. V.

that if he cared to do so he should consider himself
retained at a minimum of nine guineas a week. The
Daily News offered only seven guineas a week. The
higher bidder seemed the better, and the Morning
Chronicle offer was accepted. “ I was ready,” writes
Russell, “to fight for the side which paid me the
highest salary.” He does not, of course, refer here to
politics ; he was engaged as a reporter with no prospect
of influencing or actively sharing the political opinions
of the paper. He wrote to the Tinus, informing Delane
of the step he was about to take, and pointing out
that the salary he was offered would be much larger
than any he had drawn or could expect from Printing
House Square. To that the only answer was a short
private note, in which Delane expressed a hope that
Russell would not live to regret his decision. The
hope was no doubt intended to convey a prediction in
the contrary sense, and this was duly fulfilled.

Whether it would have affected his decision or not,
Russell, as a matter of fact, was ignorant that the old
Whig journal to which he was binding himself was
contemplating a surrender of its name and fortune to
a new party that was to appear in the political field.
The progress made by the Times owing to its dashing
adventures in the struggle for news, especially news
from the Far East, was justly attracting more readers ;
and on the increased circulation followed the growing
patronage of advertisers. At that time editors and
leader-writers were coming forth into the daylight, or
at least into the effulgence of drawing-rooms ; they no
longer hid their lights; even the names of writers who
employed noms de guerre were scented out and spread
abroad in polite society. Within a few years of this
time “Historicus” (Sir William Harcourt), whose

1845 ] an audacious reporter

57

letters to the Times were much praised by the dis-
cerning, was almost as well known as he was in the
height of his political power thirty or forty years
later. The Press, for all that, was held at arm’s length,
and it was a surprise when the summer-house in the
garden of Buckingham Palace was thrown open to
a select party of journalists. One daring representa-
tive of a daily paper, which was considered the organ
of fashionable life, was notorious for the audacity with
which he penetrated secrets held to be sacred by the
official customs of the time, and it was reported that
once he was detected on board the Royal yacht in
disguise when the Queen and Prince Consort were
on an excursion, and was obliged to continue his
journey in a dinghey towed behind. Another story
was that he had been recognised as one of the waiters
at the King of the Belgians’ dinner table when Queen
Victoria was being entertained in Belgium. He was
accustomed to relate how he baffled the precautions of
the owner of Apsley House to prevent any newspaper
report of a wedding there, by assuming the dress and
functions of an “odd man ” at the marriage feast At
every movement of the Queen by land or water, at
every departure or arrival of a distinguished person,
and at every ceremony, he was sure to be present,
and in the long run he broke through the defences of
official and fashionable life. Russell writes of this man ;

“ For all I know of him he was a kindly, obliging,
and obsequious colleague when we ran now and then
in couples ; he served the paper which paid him with
the utmost devotion, and if he circulated!^ small beer he
pleased those for whom such records are prepared.”

The newspaper world of London — and not only
that world — was stirred to the depths by the rumours

58 THE RAILWAY MANIA [Chap. V.

of the extraordinary preparations made by the pro-
prietors of the new journal, the Daily News, to crush
competition. The secession from the established
papers to Bouverie Street was large ; every induce-
ment was held out to critics, leader-writers, and
reporters ; and to retain their best men the Morning
Chronicle, the Standard, the Morning Herald, the
Morning Post, and other journals had to make a
distinct advance in the rates of pay.

“The 2ist of January, 1846, came at last,” writes
Russell, “and there was a wild rush for the first
number. At the sight of the outer sheet, hope at once
lighted up the gloom of Printing House Square, the
Strand, and Shoe Lane. The Daily News, No. i, was
ill-printed on bad paper, and ‘ badly made up,’ and,
despite the brilliant picture from Italy by Dickens,
was a fiasco. There were reports that there had been
a Saturnalia among the printers. I am not sure that
there were not social rejoicings that night in the
editorial chambers which had been so long beset by
dread._ Dickens had gathered round him newspaper
celebrities, critics in art, music and literature, corre-
spondents, politicians, statists. Yea, even the miscalled
penny-a-liner was there. But Dickens was not a good
editor; he was the best reporter in London, and as a
journalist he was nothing more. He had no political
instincts or knowledge, and was ignorant of and
indifferent to what are called 'Foreign Affairs’;
indeed, he toM me himself that he never thought
about them till the Revolution of 1848. He had
appointed as manager his father, whom he is said
to have immortalised in Micawber, and if his father
was not really a Micawber, he was at all events desti-
tute of the energy and experience of Delane, senior.
Dickens having all the tools at his hand to turn
out a splendid newspaper, failed to exhibit even
moderate carpentry. W^t he did was to shake the
old confidence in established relations, break up old
associations and raise the cost of the personnel in all
departments.”

1846] THE DAILY NEWS 59

Such is Russell’s account of the birth of the Daily
News — an unfavourable start which was soon to be
redeemed by brilliant progress. The energy and
skill of certain representatives of the Daily News were
to cause Russell many misgivings before the end of
his life.

Russell’s work for the Morning Chronicle kept him
in the Press Gallery of the House of Commons. This
was the very work he had hoped to engage in per-
manently, for he was well pleased with the foretaste
of it which the Times had given him. He tells us
that in all other departments of journalism there was
uncertainty of tenure ; differences of opinion were to
be feared between editors and their leader-writers and
reviewers ; but with all these things the Parliamentary
reporter had no concern, and as long as he made no
professional blunder, was diligent, exact and tolerably
quick, he might rely on the continuance of his
engagement.

CHAPTER VI

WORKING FOR THE MORNING CHRONICLE

At the close of the first session’s work for the
Morning Chronicle, Russell went over to Ireland to
be married. There were no settlements to be made,
but his prospects seemed good enoug'h ; he had nine
guineas a week regularly, and extra pay during the
session, and, moreover, he relied on promises of work
at the Bar.

“ I was full of life and hope,” he writes. “ Sanguine
and thoughtless, I revelled m the prospect of breasting
the waves of the world.”

But before the wedding day a letter came which
might well have given him pause. The Morning
Chronicle apparently could not live the pace, and the
proprietors wrote to make a new offer of an annual
engagement at six guineas a week. They added that
if the offer were not accepted the letter was to be
taken as a “notice of the termination of your engage-
ment, which we should exceedingly regret.” It
occurred to Russell that he might bring a successful
action, but, as he admits in his diary, he was too much
in love to think seriously of anything but his marriage,
and he therefore accepted the Morning Chronicle pro-
posal. On September i6th, 1846, in the parish church
of Howth he was married to Mary Burrowes.

While he was spending his honeymoon in Ireland
famine was already stalking through the land ; the
misery and mortality were appalling. He was in-
structed by the editor of the Morning Chronicle to

1846]

THE IRISH FAMINE

61

study the land question and write some letters on
the subject ; but with a rashness and independence
which are always expensive luxuries for journalists,
he declared his ignorance of the intricate problem and
eloquently (as he thought at the time) pleaded his
right to a few weeks’ rest. He was allowed to remain
free for the time he demanded, but at his own expense
and, as he afterwards learned, to the detriment of
his reputation as “ general utility man.” At the end
of this prolonged honeymoon he was summoned to
London by his editor on important business.

On his arrival, the editor referred him to a certain
politician who was anxious to engage him for a special
purpose. That purpose was to return to Ireland and
report the details of the famine which had already
become a horrible spectre in men’s eyes, notably
owing to the letters of W. E. Forster. Russell, who
had shrunk from discussing the land problem which
was at the root of the trouble, was ready to describe,
without prejudice, the sights of the famine.

“ The interview with Sir J E was short,” he

writes. * “In sufficiently indifferent grammar the great
man indicated a disagreeable and difficult mission in
the distressed districts in the West of Ireland. I was
to write, dotting my (h) i’s and crossing my t’s, with-
out fear, favour or afection, accounts of wnat I saw,
paying particular attention to the working of the
Relief Boards and the relations between them and
the Government Inspectors. As to the question
at the root of the controversy which was raging
between the Government and the landlords about the
‘ Labouchere letter, ’t I could say little, for I knew

* This account of the Potato Famine, taken from Russell’s
autobiography, was published in the Anti-Jacobin, February 7th,
1891.

T This letter authorised a scheme for reproductive employment,
which, however, failed to reduce the distress appreciably.

62 THE MORNING CHRONICLE [Chap. VI.

little. The political economists had it all their own
way — and the people died like flies. The newspapers
were full of articles and letters discussing remedies.
Parliament devoted its best energies and its intellect
to the solution of the terrible problems involved in
dealing with the famine, in vain. The Corn Importa-
tion Bill was passed. The Peel Ministry fell. The
Irish famine gave a death blow to the agricultural
prosperity of England. The Russell Government
mistrusted the magistrates, landlords, and poor law
guardians in the distribution and appropriation of
money levied for the relief of the swarming population
afflicted W the famine. They had thrown up barri-
cades of Poor Law Board circulars and regulations to
resist jobbery and selfishness. Behind these they
placed an army of paid officials whose duty it was to
resist the assaults of the local authorities. Meantime,
men, women and children were perishing of hunger
from Cape Clear to Connemara. 1 travelled from
Limerick through Kerry, Clare, Galway ; visited Erris
and Tyrawley in an agony of pain day after day,
through that panorama of suffering and death. It
was scarcely to be wondered at if illogical raging
jurymen returned verdicts of ‘ wilful murder ’ against
Lord John Russell in a country where the Govern-
ment is supposed to be all-powerful for evil.

“ In all my subsequent career— breakfasting, dining
and supping full of horrors in full tide of war— I never
beheld sights so shocking as those which met my eyes
in that famine tour of mine in the West. They were
beyond not merely description, but imagination. The
effects of famine may be witnessed in isolated cases
by travellers in distant lands, but here at our doors
was a whole race, men, women and children, perishing
round Christian chapels and churches, railways and
steamers, and all the time generous England was ready
to pour out her treasure to save these people. I was
indignant at what I saw, but I could not say with
whom the blame lay. The children digging up roots ;
the miserable crones and the scarecrow old men in
the fields ; the ghastly adults in the relief works — all
were heartrending. One strange and fearful conse-
quence was seen in the famished children : their faces,

63

1846] SCENES OF THE FAMINE

limbs and bodies became covered with fine long hair ;
their arms and legs dwindled, and their bellies became
enormously swollen. They were bestial to behold.
Hunger changed their physical nature as it monopolised
all they had of human thought : ‘ Give us something
to eat 1 ’ I do not know if my letters, public or private,
were agreeable reading ; I think not.

“ One day we got off our car to ease the horse up
a steep hill, and we had nearly reached the top when
I perceived a shapeless object on the road. There
were two bare feet visible, and at first I thought it was
some drunkard who had fallen asleep. It was the last
sleep of a girl of sixteen or seventeen years of age.
She was lying on her face stone dead with staring
eyes and blood coming from her mouth. She had, as
it turned out, been sent by her mother from a cottage
near at hand, to buy a sack of meal at the Government
store ; as she was toiling up the hill her legs gave way
and the poor starveling stumbled with the weight on
her back, fell and died.

“ It struck me as a remarkable illustration of the
patience which is so acceptable to rulers, or of the
submissiveness which is not the chief characteristic of
freemen, that there was no general outbreak of violence,
no bread-taking, housebreaking, or great uprising
among the people. I saw and admired afterwards
the fortitude with which the English working people
in Lancashire and the cotton districts bore their priva-
tion during the great Civil War in America ; but they
endured only ‘ privations.’ There were no widespread
fields of death such as were to be seen in 1846—7 in
Skibbereen and Connemara Now and then were
cases of disorder and violence, but they were sporadic,
and they were made the most of even in the Queen’s
Speech. A visitor to Lord Clanricarde, who left
Portumna Castle one morning to catch the mail coach
for Dublin, returned in haste to the Castle to announce
that the country was up in arms. The mail coaches
were stopped. He related how he had come on a
great crowd at the cross-roads, and asked ‘ if the mail
had come up.’ He was answered by a yell, ‘ It has,
but we sent it back— bad luck to it I and to hell we’ll
send them that own it’ When Lord Clanricarde, who

64 THE MORNING CHRONICLE [Chap. VI.

at once started off with his terrified friend to see what
was the matter, appeared at the spot, the crowd was
still there, but in the best of humour. ‘ And so you’ve
been stopping the mails, have you, my boys? You’ll
suffer for this, you know I’ ‘ Oh, God forbid, your
lordship, that we’d stop the mails.’ ‘ But you told this
gentleman you had sent the mail back.’ ‘We did,
your honour’s lordship. It was the yalla mail they
sent for the Relief Works. It was that mail we would
not take, your lordship ! ’ By ‘ yalla ’ or yellow meal
was meant Indian corn-flour, to which the peasantry
had conceived a dislike, and they were awaiting the
oatmeal which had been promised them in lieu of it.
The matter was represented, I believe, in some of the
papers as an actual act of rebellion.”

In the same number of the Anti-Jacobin which con-
tained these reminiscences of the great famine, Russell
published a ghost story, also extracted from his
autobiography, which is reproduced here because the
telling of ghost stories was to his friends one of his
most familiar accomplishments. He was a born racon-
teur, and later in life when his ability in this matter
was established and his complaisance well known he
was seldom long in any company without his services
being laid under contribution. The gifts of the story-
teller are notoriously gifts of manner and personality
which appear in tone of voice, in expression of face,
and in self-possession, and these things cannot be
reproduced in print. But it will be admitted that the
Hag’s Head Ghost story as it is presented here, in its
arrangement — the brief introduction of the reader to
the scene — its simplicity, and its avoidance of apology,
reservation or explanation, provides the genuine
material of what is called a good ghost story. This
is the story : —

“ I had a singular experience in the course of my
mission whilst I was in the South-West of Ireland,

A GHOST STORY

6S

1846]

Before I went to Ennistymon I was invited by
‘Coraey’ O’Brien, M.P., to visit him. I readily
accepted the invitation, especially as I would have an
opportunity of seeing, close to his residence, the
famous cliffs of Moher. I need not describe a scene
not yet known to tourists who wander thousands of
miles away to gaze on objects of far less interest and
beauty. As I was standing at the edge of the cliffs, at
the base of which the Atlantic was breaking in
thunder and clouds of spray, some 700 feet below me,
one of the self-constituted guides who frequent such
places ranged up alongside, and after volunteering
information about the ‘ Hag’s Head ’ and the ‘ Blowing
Hole,’ the islands in Galway Bay, etc., said: 'It’s a
wonder now, yer honner, isn’t it — and it’s yerself is a
sthrong gintleman. I’ll warrant — that you couldn’t
throw a shtone into the say there below.’ There were
stones large and small on the edge of the cliff, so to
dispose of his assertion I took a piece of basalt about
the size of a penny roll, and flung it away from me
seawards. I saw the stone curve inwards and strike
the cliff high above the surf. ‘ Oh, that won’t do at
all,’ he said. Again and again I tried, and the result
was always the same. ‘ I’ll bet yer honner a shilling
or half-a-crown I’ll do it.’ He was a withered little
man. I smiled contemptuously. He picked up a flat
stone and threw it, not as I had done, straight out as
far as I could, but at an angle of 45 degrees down-
wards, and I saw the stone clear the cliff and drop into
the surf.

“ As we were at dinner that night I expressed my
admiration of the scenery of the Hag’s Head, but my
host did not seem to share my feelings. When the
company Ahe parish priest and his coadjutor, and a
couple of county neighbours) had departed, Mr. O’Brien,
having told the piper — the only one I ever heard in an
Irish house (though I have been less fortunate in
Scotland) — to retire, attended to some hot water, sugar
and lemons, and observed, ‘And you like the. Hag’s
Head ? Well 1 I would not go there now if you were
to give me a hundred pounds, and it’s not but I want
the money.’ ‘ Why, there can be no danger. There’s
an iron railing at the edge.’ ‘Yes, but I put that rail

F

R. — ^VOL. I.

66 THE MORNING CHRONICLE [Chap. VI.

up after what happened to me. I would not go to the
place, not if the Bank of Ireland railings were there.’

“ Presently he told me this story. The narrator
was a white-headed, ruddy-faced man with a ihas.sive
brow, keen grey eyes, and resolute mouth and chin.
‘ When I came into this property,’ he said, ‘ I was away
abroad, and it was some time before the agent wrote to
tell me the house was ready for me. I did not know
the country at all, and, like yourself, 1 had never seen
the cliffs of Moher. The day I arrived I took a look
at this house, and then walked to the cliffs with the

f riest with whom I was going to dine at Ennistymon.

was astonished and delighted at the spectacle, the
ocean rolling in from the west, "the next parish church
in America,’’ as his reverence said. I had always
heard there was some tradition about the Hag’s Head
and my family— how some old lady who was walking
near the cliff with her grandson and heir was whisked
into the sea by a sudden puff of wind. And there are
such puffs, and they’re very dangerous. Anyway,
the grandson succeeded, and they say the ghost of the
old woman began to haunt the cliffs. As I was looking
down on the waves I felt as if 1 was going over too.
I gave a shout, and Father Michael caught me or I’d
have been in the sea !

“ ‘Well, as I was driving home I thought that as it
was a beautiful moonlight night and a good breeze
was blowing from the west, I would take a look at the
breakers ; they were roaring like artillery. So I got
out of the gig and told the boy to go home and bid a
servant to wait up for me. I struck across the sward
straight for the Hag’s Head. I had got within seventy
or eighty yards of it when I saw on the very edge of
the cTiflf a white figure. It was moving ; alive and no
mistake. At first! thought it was a sheep, but getting
nearer I perceived that it was a woman in a white
dress with a white cap on her head. Then I remem-
bered there was some talk at dinner of a lunatic girl
who had escaped out of the asylum at Ennistymon.
I made sure that it was she, and I thought that I had

S st arrived in time to save her life, poor creature I
y plan was to creep quietly behind her, seize her in
my arms, drag her as far as I could from the edge.

1846] FLIGHT FROM THE GHOST

67

then secure her and haul her somehow to the road.
I had got close and was just about to lay hold of her,
when “ the thing ” turned on me such a face as no
human being ever had — a death’s head, with eyes
glaring out of the sockets, through tangled masses of
snow-white hair ! In an instant, with a screech that
rang through my brain, “the thing ” fell or threw itself
over the face of the cliff.

“ ‘ It was some seconds before I recovered the shock
and horror. Then trembling I crept on my hands
and knees to the verge of the cliff. I looked down on
the raging sea. As I was peering down over the
Hag’s Head I saw in the moonlight some white object
coming up the face of the cliff straight towards me I
I am not superstitious or a coward. I tried to
persuade myself it was a seal or a great sea-gull, but
presently arms and hands were visible — it was crawling
hand over hand up the cliff. I jumped to my feet and
ran for my life towards the house. As I ran the yell
the thing gave when it disappeared over the cliff was
repeated. Looking back, there was the dreadful sight.
It came over the green meadow in pursuit of me,
came nearer, nearer, not two hundred yards behind.
I bounded like a deer up the avenue and the door was
opened by my man. Again the fearful sound close at
hand. “ Shut ! Shut the door ! Do you hear that ? ’’
The man heard nothing. I went up to my room,
looked at my face in the glass ; it was pale, but it was
not that of a madman.

“ ‘ The windows of my bedroom looked on a large
walled garden ; the blinds were drawn and the light
of the moon fell through them. I was nearly undressed
when a shadow was thrown on the counterpane of the
bed from one of the windows. There was someone
on the sill I The scream was repeated. A brace of
double-barrel pistols lay on the table by my pillow.

I fired the barrels, bang ! bang ! bang I at the window
as fast as I could pull the trigger. I ran downstairs
to the hall. We called up every soul in the house,
searched every inch of the garden — there was soft soil
under my window — not a trace of a footstep or a
ladder. I had my horse saddled at once, and rode to
Ennistymon, and knocked up the priest. The first

68 THE MORNING CHRONICLE [Chap. VI.

question I asked his astonished reverence was, “ Tell
me, was I drunk when I left you ? ” “ No, you were as
sober as you are now, Mr. O’Brien ! ” And then I
told him what I have told you. “ I never,” said his
reverence, “heard of anyone but the O’Briens hearing
or seeing her, and they have her all to themselves. I
can’t make it out.” Nor can I either, Mr. Russell. I had
a rail put up at the edge of the cliff where you get the
best view of the cliffs. I have been there, now and
then, on a fine day with people — but after sunset —
never I never I ’

“No wonder I had a bad night of it after the story.
I slept but little till morning, and then, as I was dozing
off, 1 was startled by an awful cry. It proved to be
the preliminary of a flourish by the piper for the skid
before breakfast.”

Russell continued to serve the Morning Chronicle till
1847. One day in that year a meeting of the staff was
held at the office, and a change of proprietors was
announced. Those who did not wish to accept further
reductions in their salaries, and consent to various
economies, such as the abolition of “ cab money,” were
informed that they could resign. Doyle, the editor,
was to retire, and Cook was to reign in his stead, and
the elder Delane, who had seceded from the Times,
was to be the manager. Under its new management
the Morning Chronicle was to preach the doctrine of
the New England party. Russell’s departure from the
paper took place in a curious manner, which will
presently be related, not many months after this change
of ownership. In its new hands it did not prosper,
although Russell writes that it was managed with an
energy which at first promised success. Its chief coup
was the publication, in January, 1848, of the famous
Burgoyne letter, which had been written by the Duke
of Wellington to Sir John Burg03me in January,
1847.

69

1848] THE BURGOYNE LETTER

“ The letter,” says Russell, “ was not intended for
the public. It was said that some relation or friend of
Burgoyne’s found the letter on a table, had appreciated
the value of its contents, and had communicated it to
one of the Young Englanders.”

It might be inferred from these words that the action
of the Morning Chronicle in publishing the letter was
merely disreputable. It should be said, therefore, that
the contents of the letter had been known and discussed
by the “ ruling classes ” for nearly a year before it was
shown to the editor of the Morning Chronicle, and there
were many notable persons who thought the publica-
tion of it a desirable act of policy. The letter was
written by the Duke of Wellington at the time when
Sir John Burgoyne was urging upon Lord Palmerston
the better defence of the country. In the course of it
the Duke said: —

“ It is perfectly true that as we stand at present, with
our naval arsenals and dockyards not half garrisoned,
5,000 men of all arms could not be put under arms if
required for any service whatever, without leaving
standing without relief all employed on any duty, not
exciting the guards over the palaces and person of
the Sovereign.”

The Duke himself was at first apparently well
pleased that the country should know what had long
caused him deep ' anxiety. Indeed, it is impossible to
read a letter written by Sir John Burgoyne in December,
1847, without concluding that Ministers themselves
had determined to quote the Duke’s opinions in Parlia-
ment as their authority for improving the national
defences. But the letter did not have the desired
result. The public treated the idea of a French army
landing in England as preposterous, and when criticism
of the letter took the form of indulgent yet galling

70 THE MORNING CHRONICLE [Chap. VI.

reflections on the Duke’s old age and dwindling mental
powers, the Duke became offended, and then increas-
ingly indignant. Cobden, in one of his Free Trade
speeches at Manchester, remarked of the letter, “ when
I first read it, and came to its conclusion, where he
says : — ‘ I am in my seventy-seventh year ’ — I said,

‘ That explains it all, and excuses it.’ ” (Great
applause.) Lady Shelley implicitly claimed the credit
of having procured the publication of the letter (such
was the first attitude of those who looked upon
publication as a desirable act of policy) ; but Sir John
Burgoyne never regarded her behaviour as anything
but an unpardonable indiscretion. Russell’s statement
that “ some relation or friend,” of Sir John Burgoyne
communicated the letter to a Young Englander is, of
course, less definite than our later information, Sir
John Burgoyne explained in a letter to Lord FitxRoy
Somerset that it was Lady Burgoyne who showed the
letter to Lady Shelley.

In 1847 Russell went for the Morning Chronicle to
Oxford, to attend Commemoration, and while sitting
in the Sheldonian, which was hot and crowded, he
fainted. A local practitioner bled him freely, and when
he returned to London, Todd, the surgeon, who was a
sworn enemy of phlebotomy, declared that Russell
must take a holiday. “If ever you see a scoundrel
approach you with a lancet again,” he exclaimed,
“ knock him down. He has a design on your life.”
Needing little persuasion that he required a rest,
Russell applied fora holiday, sending a medical certifi-
cate with his letter. Having thus made the matter
perfectly regular in advance, to his own mind, he went
to Ireland, where his wife was staying. But the
official mind thought otherwise. The answer to his

71

1847] NO ILLNESS ALLOWED

letter informed him that he must resume his work
at once or consider his engagement ended. This
peremptory letter brought him back to London, to
consult his cousin Robert Russell. He found him for
the first time utterly indifferent to a tale of wrong.
Robert was in love. Instead of considering Russell’s
position he grew expansive upon his own, and instead
of examining Russell’s important correspondence he
produced letters from his fiancee, and read and re-read
aloud the more striking passages. Hurrying to the
Morning Chronicle office in the Strand, Russell was
informed that Mr. Delane, senior, was “ out,” and it
was impossible to say when he would be “ in.” Russell
understood .what that meant and did not press
the matter. Mr. Cook, however, was “in,” and he
informed Russell immediately he entered the room
that the editor himself was obliged to work whether
he was well or ill, and that the staff was not an
invalid corps. He was sure the illness was real, but,
nevertheless, he did not want to examine doctors’
certificates.

Russell considered himself genuinely unable to
work, and had no alternative but to consider his
engagement at an end. On the same evening he
returned to Dublin, to think over the situation, which
was by no means encouraging. Owing to his wife’s
health he was obliged to conceal from her the failure
of his mission to London. To London, however, they
both returned, where he took lodgings at 7, China
Terrace, Kensington, and set to work to read for the
Bar, as well as to do such literary work as his head
would permit. He attended the Courts and Appeal
Cases in the House of Lords whilst waiting for some-
thing to turn up. Meanwhile he had two curious

72 THE MORNING CHRONICLE [Chap. VI

experiences of the way in which some people make
money : —

“ My landlord, a retired naval officer, asked me one
day for a private interview. ‘ Probably about the rent,’

I thought. Captain L , however, did not allude to

that subject ‘ You know Mr. H , I believe,’ he

began, naming a well-known member of Parliament to
whom indeed I had applied for an official appointment.
‘Yes, I do.’ ‘Very well, if you can interest him in

getting_ such-and-such a post for my friend Mr. ,

who is in every way eligible, I promise you on the day
he is named £500. There I ’ I explained that I was a
candidate for a far smaller place myself, and that I

feared I could be of no use. But Captain L was

not by any means done with me. He had somehow or
other ascertained the names of people with whom I
was acquainted, and he read out from his pocket-book
a list of rewards as from a police register— a tide-
waitership in the gift of So-and-so, ;^300 ; stipendiary

magistrate, £700, and so on. ‘ Lady , if you can

get at her, is invaluable. I have done a good deal of
business with her, but we had a quarrel and she won’t
deal directly with me now.’ I could not ‘ get at ’ her

ladyship, even if I would, and Captain L having

advised me solemnly to think over the matter, gave me
a little memorandum and so departed. I believe he
really made what is called a good thing out of his
business. I often saw him in the Lobby of the House
or waiting about Committee-rooms.

“ The other experience was of a different kind. One
of my Temple comrades came to me with a bundle of

papers. ‘ My uncle,’ said he, ‘ is a doctor at M ,

which is a very rising place ; there are plenty of rivals,
but if he gets his name known it will enable him to
beat the lot of them. He has asked me to write an
account of the place, and here are all the facts. Never
was such a place ! — natives live for ever ; gravel soil,
pure water, highest temperature in winter, lowest in
summer, air finer than anywhere else. Suited for
every kind of invalid. Other health resorts simply
nowhere. If you will dress these facts up, throw in
some quotations, and describe the routes, showing how

1847] birth of first CHILD

73

M is the centre of the civilized world, and all roads

lead to it, say a hundred and fifty pages, Nunky will
pay you a hundred pounds. But it must be ready by
the beginning of the season.’ I accepted. Was I a
base hireling ? I only know that Dr. - — ’s work was
noticed and praised, that he flourished exceedingly,

and so did the seaside town of M . Probably no

one ever troubled to analyse the statistical and hydro-
metrical tables and mean averages. I suspect that

M was as healthy as most places of the kind, and

that Dr. was a trustworthy medical officer.”

Russell’s first child was born in 1847 while he was
living at China Terrace, and justice may most easily
be done to his pride and satisfaction by quoting from
a letter, written a short time afterwards to a relation,
in which he described the singular qualities of the
baby. The letter is addressed from "Our Palace at
Kensington, Terrace of China, 7th edifice,” and goes
on : —

“I must tell you of everything wonderful and
strange that has happened since last I wrote. Among
these, the chief is that little Alice never stops sleeping,
feeding, or crying, all day and all night, and that she
is growing very big and strong, and so fast as she gets
big, Mary and I get little. She is very fair, and on the
whole, not a bad sort of little thing. Big blue eyes,
larger and darker than Mary’s, with very long
eyelashes, a very pretty mouth, dark hair, a bullet
head, rather snub nose in its present development, and
to complete all is as fat as butter, and no wonder, for
she never stops tormenting her mother to feed her.
And Mary is a regular slavey to it, and hides herself
in dark and out-of-the-way corners with it_ from
morning to night and cares for no earthly thing in this
world beside, so that I begin to get jealous of my own
little baby.”

CHAPTER VII

BACK TO THE TIMES

Unexpectedly, and without solicitation on his part,
Russell was invited in the autumn of 1848 to renew
his connection with the Times. There was a tradition
in the Times office that anyone who left the standard
of Printing House Square to fight under another
should be held an outlaw. Russell was aware of this,
and was both surprised and flattered by the new
offer. Delane, it seems, had thought that Russell
ought to have been retained by a permanent engage-
ment at the time when he was captured by the
Morning Chronicle. The letter from the manager of the
Times asked Russell if he was willing to be a repre-
sentative of the paper till the meeting of Parliament,
when a post would be reserved for him as a reporter
in the gallery of the House.

A few days afterwards, Russell was invited to dinner
with Delane at Serjeants’ Inn, and before the party
went down to the dining-room Delane informed him
that he was to have an annual engagement.

‘T remember,” says Russell, “that in the conversation,
someone stated that Captain Shandon was intended by
Thackeray for Stirling. But Thackeray afterwards
told me that Shandon was intended for half a dozen
Irishmen rolled into one.” *

Almost as soon as he re-joined the Times., Russell was
sent to Ireland to report the State Trials of 1848. He

* It is generally believed that Captain Shandon was drawn from
Maginn.

1848]

THE STATE TRIALS

7 S

had already watched the Chartist demonstrations in
London, and these and the State Trials were the
particular phenomena which fell under his observation
of that wonderful year of political portents, when a
tide of mingled revolution and democracy swept
across Europe. Here is the narrative of the State
Trials in his own words * : —

“On the 20th of September I left Dublin for
Clonmel. The State Trials (never ending, still begin-
ning, these State Trials) of the chief of the confederates
in ‘ The Rising ’ which subsided in the Widow
McCormack’s cabbage garden, were about to open.
The Times sent with me Mr. Nicholls, of the Chancery
Bar, a precise, stiff, dry but kindhearted man, whose
short visit to Ireland filled him with anger — now
against the people, now against the priests, anon
against the Government (he was not qijite sure who
was to blame) for the misery he beheld. We had
comfortable lodgings in the house of a respectable
cutler named Holmes, in Dublin Street, and Delane,
who had been on a visit to Bernal Osborne at
Newton Anner, came into Clonmel to see us on his
way to London. He was impressed with the gravity
of the situation. ‘ It’s useless talking of the loyalty
or disloyalty of the people 1 They are all against us I
They do not like our laws, our ways, or anything that
is ours ! But the Government and landowners,
supported by the police and the army, can always deal
with insurrection, and the jury to-morrow will be
quite safe.’

“ It was a very remarkable scene next morning.
We made our way with difficulty through a dense
crowd to the court-house, which was guarded by a
large body of police with fixed bayonets. Horse, foot,
and artillery were close at hand in readiness to
support them. We passed between a line of police to
our places, reserved by the High Sheriff. The court
was crowded from floor to ceiling: on the bench,
arrayed in their scarlet and ermine robes, and in

* Published in the Anti-Jacobin, January 31st, 1891.

76

BACK TO THE TIMES [Chap. VII.

flowing wigs, were the four judges— the Chief Justice,
Mr. Justice Blackburne, Mr. Justice Crampton, Mr.
Justice Perrin — who were sent down under a special
commission to try the prisoners. There was a great
‘ Bar ’ retained for the Crown on the one side, and for
the prisoners on the other. The proceedings began
with the skirmishing between counsel which usually
precedes the battle, giving ample room for the display
of the ingenuity and finesse which are supposed to
characterise the Irish Bar. There were dramatic
scenes and moving incidents from_ day to day. I may
be under the influence of impressions formed at a time
when I was what is called emotional if 1 now express
the opinion that on no occasion in any court of law
was there a more brilliant example of learning,
argument, passion, and wit, than that by which counsel
for the prisoners, in the long course of this trial,
moved the audience, even tnough they failed to
convince thejury or to divert the attention of the judges
from the essential issues before them. P'rom the
gallery at times burst forth wailing cries or suppressed
groans as the witnesses forged link after link of the
chain which bound the accused to their fate. The
dignity of the Court was exemplary, and it was with
difficulty we could believe our eyes, or rather our ears,
when, one night, after dinner, to which we were
invited by the judges, we heard Mr. Justice Blackburne
trolling an Irish melody, with exquisite pathos, in a
rich mellow voice. I found that my colleague Nicholls
was by degrees touched with something like sympathy
for the prisoners. ‘ Smith O’Brien,’ he said, * after all,
conducts himself like a gentleman, and that Mr.
McManus is a fine honest fellow. I pity himl I
daresay if one knew Meagher he would turn out to be
a pleasant, agreeable man, full of enthusiasm and
poetry, but he is without judgment'

" The end came at last On October 8th, the jury
came into court with a verdict of ‘guilty’ against
William Smith O’Brien for high treason and for
levying war against the Queen, with a recommendation
to the merciful consideration of the Crown. He heard
the words unmoved, with his arms folded, his head
thrown back, and a scornful smile upon his lips. He

SMITH O’BRIEN

77

1848]

listened to the judge with the utmost calmness, and
when called upon to say why sentence of death should
not be passed upon him, he spoke in measured accents,
declaring that he had done what was right as he
believed, and that he had nothing to repent but his
failure. On the 9th he was brought up and placed in
the dock to receive the sentence of the Court, which
was ‘that you, William Smith O’Brien, be drawn on a
hurdle to the place of execution, and hanged by the
neck until you be dead; and that you then shall be
disembowelled and your body divided into four
quarters, to be disposed as Her Majesty shall direct’
It was said at the time that his composure was due to
an assurance the night before that he would not be
executed, but I do not believe that he was influenced
in his defiant attitude by the knowledge that he would
only be condemned to exile for life. McManus, who
was next put on his trial, a man of action, no orator, or
phrasemonger, conducted himself with perfect pro-
priety. A resolute revolutionist, he had renounced a
competence and placed his life on the hazard of the
die in that miserable rising. Even the judges (I say
‘ even ’ because they were bound to look at the great
gravity of the offence) were moved by the honesty and
earnestness of the man. He was found guilty on the
1 2th. After him, on the isth, came O’Don oghue, then
Meagher on the 21st, each to be found guilty and be
sentenced to a traitor’s doom, on the 23rd of October.

“ The Special Commission having done their work,
rose and adjourned to December. I am ashamed to
confess that I varied the monotony of attendance at
court by an episode which, under the circumstances,
was rather hazardous. A local gentleman, not imcon-
nected with the administration of the law, at daybreak
one morning drove me out of Clonmel, and marched
me up a hill to the edge of a plateau covered with
heather. Two very ragged peasants and a dog of ^
indescribable species were awaiting us in a cutting in
the turf ; under a piece of bog oak were secreted three
fowling-pieces. And then poaching began 1 The dog
hunted ever3^hing, larks and small birds, and looked
upon grouse coursing as a rare sport. The grouse
were numerous, and so were the misses, but we

78

BACK TO THE TIMES [Chap. VII.

managed to get 1 1| brace, one hare, and two golden
plovers. One of our attendants was always on the
qui vive watching the slope of the hill,_ and looking out
for Dwyer, ‘the keeper,’ or the ‘polis,’ but w^e were
undisturbed. At the end of the day’s sport the guns
were secreted ; we descended the hill, and drove into
the town as if nothing had happened.

“ I left Clonmel on the day after the rising of the
Court, carrying with me as a souvenir a book in which
Smith O’Brien, Meagher, McManus, and O’Donoghue
signed their names ‘in remembrance,’ and very sad
and distressed I was at the fate of these miserable
men.

“ The scene was changed to Dublin — the play was
the same. On October 26th I attended the Court ot
Queen’s Bench to hear a long argument on a law point
in demurrer raised by his counsel for C. Gavan Duffy.
There I saw in the dock arraigned as a traitorous felon
the man who afterwards became a Minister of the
Crown, the Premier of Victoria, and a Knight of St.
Michael and St. George, and who continued to hold, I
believe, the same opinions — their expression a little
dulcified, perhaps, — which he propounded in the
Nation. More fortunate than his confederates, he
escaped the meshes of the law, and defeated the
Government in two prosecutions against him for
treason. These sittings lasted for several weeks. The
judges now and then gave judgment against the Crown,
and as the Crown lawyers were bound to justify their
opinions, each adverse judgment was a basis for a new
phase of legal action.

“ There was an incident one day which illustrated the
composure and readiness of Judge Blackburne, though
words could scarcely give an idea of his dignity m
court. He had just risen at the close of a long argu-
ment when a red-headed man got up in the body of
the court and exclaimed in a loud voice, ‘ My lord !
My lord I ’ Blackburne turned and asked severely,
‘ Who are you, sir ? ’ ‘ My lord, my name is J.

O’Brien ; I am an attorney of this honourable court.’
The judge exchanged a word with the officer below
him. ‘ Proceed, Mr. O’Brien. What have you to say ?’
‘ My lord, I am requested by several respectable

1849 ]

RUSH, THE MURDERER

79

citizens of Dublin to ask your lordship when this
honourable Court means to give judgment in the case
of “Smith O’Brien and others versus the Queen in
error ” ’ Blackburne looked at the attorney, and then
with great solemnity, pausing on every word, said:
‘ Mr. O’Brien 1 Tell the respectable citizens of Dublin
who requested you to put that question to the Court
that you did put it to the Court, and that the Court gave
you no reply.’ His lordship retired, and Mr. O’Brien
collapsed.”

Russell returned to London early in 1849. Unfor-
tunately for his legal studies, as distinguished from
legal reporting. Delane had formed a high opinion of
his ability in the latter respect He had not been back
very long before he was requested to attend the trial
of Rush for the murder of Mr. Jermy and his son at
Stansfield Hall — a crime which created an extra-
ordinary sensation at the time, as well it might

“Rush was tried at Norwich,” Russell writes
in his autobiography,* “ before Baron Rolfe I was
accompanied by my old friend and colleague, J. C.
MacDonald, and from the 29th March till April 4th we
were in court occupied with the trial We sat nearly
immediately behind the dock in which Rush stood. I
could have placed my hand on the man’s back — a
broad lumpy back with round shoulders which seemed
to grow out of a huge bulbous head — no trace of neck.
On one occasion when I laid down my penloiife on the
ledge of the bench, the warder behind him whispered,
‘Put up that knife, I beg you, sir! He has caught
sight of it already.’

“ The night he was found guilty a cattle salesman
told the company in the coffee-room of the hotel where
we were staying that he had known Rush for many
years, and had transacted a good deal of business with
him. On returning one night from London he was
astonished to see his wife standing at the door of his
house in a state of great agitation. A man she did not

* Published in the Anti-Jacohin^ January 31st, 1891.

8o

BACK TO THE TIMES [Chap. VII.

know, she said, had called and told her he was going
to stop for the night, as he was an old friend of her
husband. She had given him his dinner and had tried
to converse with him, ‘but he had such a frightful
look’ that an undefinable dread came over her. She
told her guest she had a headache, and locked herself
in till her husband came home. As she was whispering
to him the parlour-door was opened and the grazier
saw his friend Rush 1 Rush went next morning, and
the grazier, in accordance with a promise of long
standing, accepted an invitation for a few da3rs’ rabbit
shooting at Rush’s farm. The night of his visit he was
awakened by a woman’s screams. Getting up to
ascertain the cause, he was met by Rush, who told
him to ‘ go back to his room, it was only his wife in her
tantrums.’ The woman, who was locked in her room,
said she was bleeding to death ; the grazier appealed
to Rush to send for a doctor, and offered to drive to
the nearest town for one. There was an altercation,
the grazier packed up his things, got out his trap, and
drove to the railway. ‘ I never saw Rush again until
I came to see him in the dock. I shall wait to see him
hanged.'

“My colleague, who remained to describe the last
moments of the murderer, had a good view of the last
scene, which he never forgot. A well-known press-
man, great in descriptions of hangings, was less
favourably situated, being in the moat of the prison;
but he established an understanding with someone
who was on the top of the wall, and as the work of the
hangman was taking its course he called out from time
to time, ‘ Is he struggling much ? How is he doing
now ? ’ and recorded the answers.”

During the Rush trial Delane wrote a letter to
Russell, which may be quoted as one of the innumer-
able minor proofs that he was a great editor because
he was always open to new ideas — ^new ideas, it should
be admitted, usually presented to him in the first place
by himself Newspapers are conservative institu-
tions — even the most Radical of them — and rules and
traditions are hard to change. It has often happened

DELANE AS EDITOR

8i

1849]

that the only way of changing trifling and unessential
customs in the production of a newspaper has been to
change the editor. Delane, who respected the business
management of a newspaper as a permanent institu-
tion, permitting of few variations, had no rules for the
literary work of a paper. Each event had its own rule
invented for it on its merits.

“ I should be obliged,” he wrote to Russell, “ by
your giving a very full report of Rolfe’s charge in
Rush’s case. It is generally a fashion in circuit reports
to pay very little attention to this part of the proceed-
ings ; but it is really of the utmost importance to the
results of the trial, and in this case, from the extra-
ordinary course taken by the prisoner, it will possess
peculiar interest. Of course, I do not wish to have
the mere repetitions of evidence, but Rolfe’s opinion
upon the relative value of testimonies will be well
worth having.”

In June of this year, 1849, Russell heard with sincere
regret of Lady Blessington’s death in Paris.

“ She had been gracious to me at her receptions at
Kensington Gore,” he writes, “where I met Prince
Louis Napoleon and was presented to him. I was
standing at the door waiting for a cab one wet night
when the Prince’s brougham was announced. As he
passed out he said very courteously, ‘ Can I offer you
a seat into town ? ’ I gladly accepted it, and on our
way the Prince asked me questions about the Times,
editor, writers, etc., which I was little able to answer.
The next time I saw Prince Louis Napoleon he was
President of the French Republic ; the next time again
he was Emperor. I attended an Imperial reception at
the Tuileries. I assisted at the entry of the Imperial
Guard after the Crimea. I saw Louis Napoleon at the
great review at Longchamp with Emperors and Kings
by his side ; and I saw him after Sedan, driving through
the street, a prisoner, on his way to Germany. The
story went tnat he had not been amiable to Lady
Blessington, who had been devoted to him when he

G

R. — ^VOL. I-

82

BACK TO THE TIMES [Chap. VII.

was in London. When she went to Paris the Presi-
dent received her with coldness. He asked her, ‘Do
you intend to stay long in Paris ? ’ ‘ No, Prince,’

she answered; ‘do you?’ It was averred by her
friends that her sudaen illness was caused by the
shock she received at the Tuileries.”

In the anxious time when Russell scarcely yet knew
whether he was ultimately to be a journalist or a
barrister, he burned the candle at both ends, as though
that would make his way plainer. Early in 1850 he
came to the conclusion, like many young men who
have over-taxed themselves, that he had heart disease,
On the advice of his cousin he went to consult
Dr. Marshall Hall. No sooner had he described his
symptoms than the doctor astonished him by walking
out of the room. Commanding Russell to follow
him, he ran as fast as he could upstairs.

“When we got to the second landing,” writes
Russell, “ he stopped short, put my back against the
wall and put his ear against my waistcoat. ‘Nothing
organically wrong,’ he explained ; ‘ nervous trouble,
too much work, too little play.’ His prescription was
simple — eat roasted apples.”

In June Russell was called to the Bar at the Middle
Temple. Instead of giving his call party in hall
according to custom, he had a dinner at the London
Tavern, which was attended by Delane and about a
dozen of his friends. There was much " speechifying,”
and of course a great career was predicted for him.
The immediate and most contradictory sequel is
described in his autobiography.

“ Two days afterwards a disastrous debut in Court
before Mr. Justice Patteson covered me with confusion
I held a brief for an attorney who had been struck off
the rolls, and who, fortified by many affidavits, made

i8so] A DISASTROUS FIRST BRIEF

83

application to be re-admitted. He was opposed by
tne Incorporated Law Society, represented by several
counsel. The Society opposed his re-admission on
the grounds that he had practised as an attorney in
the County Courts. I had constructed an ingenious
and able argument on the subtle but solid distinction
between agent and attorney which seemed to me
irresistible. As I entered the Court I was met by
my client, his wife, and several children, who clustered
round me while their poor father refreshed my memory
with points and by repetition of the justice of his cause.
The family took their seats in the place reserved for
the public, but my client planted himself below me
and never took his eyes off me for a moment as I
scanned my voluminous notes. I was informed that
my case would probably come on in an hour, and it
was with something like an electric shock benumbing
me for the time, that I heard it called in what seemed
to be five minutes. ‘ My Lord,’ I began — and then I
stopped, for I observed growing out of the learned
judge’s wig something like a small proboscis. ‘ What
do you say ? I can’t hear yoa’ ' My Lord,’ I resumed,
‘ I appear in this case to make an application on behalf

of John Jones ’ Here I was stopped again. ‘Not

a word can I hear. Why can’t you speak out, sir?
Come nearer.’ I gathered up my brief and my notes,
letting some of them fall on the way, and, aided by
kindly seniors, made my way to a seat nearer the
judge. I was utterly demoralised. Still I stood up
to that terrible trumpet, and was getting on pretty
well, when I used an unfortunate expression. ‘ My
client, my lord, is not a rich man.’ ‘ What do you
mean? If he is a rich man and had acted as is
alleged, it is all the worse, but the question has nothing
to do with the matter before the Court’ ‘ I did not
say, my Lord, that my client is a rich man. I meant
to say that he is not rich — that he is a poor man.’
* Oh, not rich ? Then why did you say he was, eh ? ’
I lost my voice, my memory ; I could hear orders to
speak up. I could see my client making mute but
frantic appeals to me with a face of despair, but the
thread of my ideas was broken; I sat down before
my learned brother below uttered his preliminary

84 BACK TO THE TIMES [Chap. VII.

‘ My Lud.’ I was aware I represented a lost cause,
and when Mr. Justice Patteson, in refusing the roll,
said obiter, ‘ The argument of the learned counsel, as
far as I could understand it, and with the utmost
attention in my power I am not sure that I do,’ I
was sure he did not. I rushed out of the Court and
got into a cab, with the ex-attorney and all his family
at my heels."

CHAPTER VIII

THE DANISH WAR OF 1850

In July, 1850, Russell had his first experience as a
special correspondent with an army in the field.
has been called the “ father of war correspondents,”
but he disapproved of the title “ war correspondent,”
which he thought rather absurd. The time he spent
with the Danish Army in the Schleswig-Holstein
War was so brief that it would be wrong to say
that he perceived there the opportunities of a war
correspondent (the established word cannot now be
avoided), as he afterwards recognised and seized
them in the Crimea. In a sense there had been war
correspondents even before the Schleswig-Holstein
War. As Mr. S. T. Sheppard pointed out in an
article called “ The Genesis of a Profession,” in the
Untied Service Magazine of March, 1907, there was a
precedent for the work of war correspondents in the
old Swedish Intelligence, which contained an enter-
taining correspondence about the army of Gustavus
Adolphus. But a more deliberate and definite war
correspondence began in 1807, when the Times com-
missioned Henry Crabb Robinson to go to Altona*

* Mr. Sheppard might have mentioned among those whose work
resembled that of a modem war correspondent a writer named
Finnerty. This man, on behalf of the Morning Chronicle^ tried to
accompany Lord Chatham’s expedition against Antwerp in 1809,
which ended so pitifully in the swamps of Walcheren. In July,
1809, Bagot wrote to the Admiralty: “ Mr. Finnerty, so well known
by his violent and factious writings, and by his connection with the
editor of the Morning Chronicle^ has quitted London, and is now
actually on board one of H.M.’s ships (preparing to sail with the

86 THE DANISH WAR OF 1850 [Chap. VIII.

Robinson, celebrated, of course, as a diarist, was a
friend of Madame de Stael, Lamb, Coleridge, Words-
worth and Shelley, and one of the founders of the
Athenaeum Club and of University College, London.

“ Robinson’s knowledge of ^ German," says Mr.
Sheppard, “ was his chief qualification for this under-
taking of 1807, which resulted in a series of letters
‘ from the banks of the Elbe,’ published between March
and August. The possibilities of such a commission
were shown, not so much by those letters, as by one
which he wrote after his return to England in justifica-
tion of the seizure of the Danish fleet by the British.
The letter was quoted in the House of Lords, and was,
according to its author, more to the purjpose than any
fact alleged by Government speakers. The idea was
followed up in the following year, when, he writes,

* the Spanish revolution had broken out, and as soon
as it was likely to acquire so much consistency as to
become a national concern, the Times of course must
have its correspondent in Spain.’ He adds, in all
modesty, that he had not the qualifications to be
desired. In July he went to Corunna, with instruc-
tions to collect news and forward it by every vessel
that left the port. ‘ I spent the time,’ he wrote in his
diary, ‘between the reception and transmission of
intelligence, in translating the public documents and
in writing comments. I was anxious to conceal the
nature of my occupation, but I found it necessary from
time to time to take some friends into my confidence.’
He does not appear to have seen any fighting, but his
letters were interesting, even if his military judgment
was not great. . . . Crabb Robinson’s method of
obtaining ‘ information from the seat of war ’ may not
at the present time seem adequate, but in those days
even the darters of publishing war news were clearly
perceived. The Duke of Wellington’s despatches are
full of allusion to the subject, and show how the
English papers unintentionally erred in trying to do

expedition) in the capacity of private secretary to one of the captains
of the fleet.” Finnerty was brought back by Lord Castlereagh, and
subsequently abused the expedition and Lord Castlereagh in such
terins that he was convicted of libel and imprisoned for a year.

87

i8o9 — 37] WAR CORRESPONDENTS

their duty to the public. Writing from Badajos on
November 21st, 1809, to Lord Liverpool, he said, ‘ I beg
to draw your Lordship’s attention to the frequent para-
graphs in the English newspapers describing the
position, the numbers, the objects, and the means of
attaining them, possessed by the armies in Spain and
Portugal. In some instances the English newspapers
have accurately stated, not only the regiments occupy-
ing a position, but the number of men fit for duty of
which each regiment was composed ; and this intelli-
gence must have reached the enemy at the same time
as it did me, at a moment at which it was most
important that he should not receive it’ About a
year later the Duke had to issue an order on the
subject of the private correspondence of officers, as
important information about some batteries at Cadiz
had found its way into an English paper. Had war
correspondents in the modern sense existed then, the
Duke would probably have treated them with more
Japanese severity. ... It may possibly have been
owing to the Duke’s strenuous and repeated warnings
that no special correspondent appears to have been in
the later Peninsular campaigns or in the Waterloo
campaign. In 1837, however, the tribe reappeared,
when C. L Gruneisen, better known as a musical
critic, was sent to Spain by the Morning Post He
went to St. Sebastian to report upon the condition of
the British Legion, and then accompanied the Royal
Expedition of 1837. He certainly saw fighting, and at
the battle of Villar le los Navarros he managed to
prevent the massacre of some of the Christian prisoners
by the Carlist conquerors. For this act of humanity
he received the order created by Don Carlos to cele-
brate the victory. The war correspondent was not
yet, however, recognised as an institution, as is shown
by the fact that Mr. Gruneisen on being taken prisoner
only escaped being shot, at General Espartero’s orders,
by the timely intervention of the British Ambassador
at Madrid. The fierce general explained afterwards
that his prisoner had done more harm with his pen
than any sword of the Carlist generals, and gave notice
that he would shoot all Carlist correspondents. A
Captain Henningsen, who was acting as the Times

88 THE DANISH WAR OF 1850 [Chap. VIII.

correspondent, was also taken prisoner, and the two
were only liberated on condition that they gave their
parole not to enter Spain again during the war.”

George Borrow praised in “ The Bible in Spain ”
the work of such men as Gruneisen.

“ What extraordinary men,” he writes, " are these
reporters of English newspapers'! Surely if there be
any class of individuals entitled to the appellation of
cosmopolites it is these men, who pursue their avoca-
tion in all countries and under all hardships, and
accommodate themselves to the manners of all classes.
Their fluency of style as writers is only surpassed by
their facility in conversation, and their attainments in
classical and polite literature only by their profound
knowledge of the world. The activity, energy, and
courage they display are truly remarkable. 1 saw
them during the three days in Paris mingle with the
canaille and the rabble behind the barriers, while the
mitrailk was flying in all directions, and the desperate
cuirassiers were dashing their fierce horses against the
feeble bulwarks. There they stood, dotting down what
they saw in their note-books, as unconcernedly as if
reporting a Reform meeting in Finsbury Square or
Covent Garden, while in Spain they accompanied the
Carlist and Christine guerillas in some of their most
desperate expeditions, sleeping on the ground, expos-
ing themselves fearlessly to hostile bullets, to the
inclemency of winter, and the fierce rays of summer's
burning sun.”

Russell says so little of the Schleswig-Holstein War
in his diary that it is evident he looked upon the
experience as scarcely diflferent from what he had
been going through for over eight years ; for him it
marked no new era in journalism, and there is no
reason why we should claim for him what he did not
claim himself. He took this small Danish war, so
to speak, in his stride, reporting it in the ordinary
course of his business, as he would have reported one
of O’Connell’s meetings. Most war correspondents.

1850]

WAR CORRESPONDENTS

89

indeed, are war correspondents by accident. They
become war correspondents because they are, or are
thought to be, competent journalists, not necessarily
because they understand war. One is not to conceive
a war correspondent as a sort of grown-up boy scout.
The chief desideratum is the ability to describe clearly
what one sees. That ability which postulates a
trained sense of proportion does not necessarily
belong to soldiers, nor does the aptitude to set civil
or political considerations in the scale with purely
military exigencies ; if it were otherwise, it would be
ridiculous to employ anyone but a soldier as a war
correspondent. In his preface to his reminiscences of
the Crimean War, called "The Great War with
Russia,” * Russell wrote many years afterwards : —

" Though I had always been fond of military matters
I knew nothing of what is called by soldiers soldiering.
My early ambition to wear a uniform could not be

f ratified. I tried to get into the Spanish Legion,f but
was too young. When I became an ensign in the
Enfield Militia I was too old, and I had little taste
and less leisure for the training. So Colonel Mark
Wood cut short my inglorious career on account of
absence and neglect of duty.”

The events which led up to the Schleswig-Holstein
War may be summarised here. The Treaty of Peace
between the King of Prussia, on behalf of the
Germanic Confederation, and Denmark was signed
on July sth, 1850. Nothing in this Treaty changed
the relation of the Duchy of Holstein to the Germanic
States ; it remained as before a member of the

* “ The Great War with Russia. The Invasion of the Crimea. A
Personal Retrospect of the Battles of the Alma, Balaclava and
Inkerman, and of the Winter, 1854 — 55.” George Routledge &
Sons, Limited.

t The extraordinary corps of Englishmen which fough^ under the
command of De Lacy Evans, against the CarUsts in Spain.

90 THE DANISH WAR OF 1850 [Chap. VIII.

Confederation ; but Schleswig was to be considered a
part of Denmark, and as such might be immediately
occupied by that Power. The Prussian force was to
be withdrawn. Holstein had during the years 1848 —
1849 organised an army of 30,000 men — four times
larger than any force it was required to contribute
to the Federation. This army was now to be put to
the test. The Treaty satisfied hardly anyone; the
Germans considered that Schleswig had been aban-
doned and the German cause there betrayed ; on the
other hand, the Danes were relieved from the possible
hostility of Prussia only to find themselves in the pre-
sence of an excited people in the Duchies, an insurgent
and determined Government in Holstein, and an army
if not equal in numbers to their own, large enough to
be formidable.

The Holstein Government declared in a Proclama-
tion that the Treaty left it to the Duchies to defend
their rights unhindered.

“ The heavily-oppressed Schleswigers,” it said,
“shall not be deprived of our protection. We are
opposed to a peaceful settlement, but if the Danish
forces invade Schleswig under any pretext whatever,
measures of resistance will be adopted ; our enemy is
well-armed and fully prepared. The Staathalterschaft
adheres firmly and faithfully to the rights of the land
and its natural and hereditary Sovereign.”

On July 15th the Prussian troops began their
retirement, and the Holstein infantry, under General
Willisen and Colonel von der Tann, Chief of his Staff,
began their entry into Schleswig. Eckenforde was
garrisoned, and war might be said to have begun.
Within two days a corps of 2,000 Danes entered
Flensburg, and on the morning of the 18th a skirmish
took place between the outposts near Bilschau.

GENERAL WILLISEN

91

1850]

By this time Russell had arrived at the theatre of
war. He was invited to accompany General Willisen
when he inspected the positions of the Schleswig-
Holstein brigades.

“ The heat was excessive,” he wrote, “ but not half
so oppressive as the dust; the by-roads are fetlock
deep, composed of the finest sand, and between the
high hedges the passage of some thirty horsemen at
full gallop raises a cloud so dense that one can scarcely
see his immediate predecessor. . . . Once a rush was
made at what appeared to be a roadside public-house,
but either the host was not to be found or the barrels
were dry, or something wrong in the_ household, and
as there was no time for explanation we pushed
forward again, having effected nothing but frightening
a lot of geese into a pond, not without some envy of
their cool and comfortable appearance in the element.
There were rumours afterwards of some bowls of
milk captured and emptied, but I did not see the
operation.”

Russell found General Willisen “ a hale and hearty
figure, though nearly sixty, rapid in speech and quicker
in movement than many younger men.” Of the second
in command. Colonel von der Tann, he says ; —

“He has the reputation of being the most daring
soldier in the army ; in the last campaign he attempted
things that had they not succeeded would have been
called rash, and they succeeded simply because,
according to all ordinary rules, they ought to have
been impossible.”

On July 2Sth the decisive action of Idstedt, which
lasted eleven hours, was fought between the Danish
Army and the insurgent forces.

“ It was attended by great loss on both sides,” wrote
Russell, “ and terminated with the total defeat of the
Holstein army, under General Willisen, which is at

93 THE DANISH WAR OF 1850 [Chap. VIII.

this moment, 3 o’clock p.m., retreating through the
town in tolerably good order, to take up a position
between here and Kensburg. It was known that the
Danes would begin the attack at daybreak, or soon
after, but they harassed the posts to the right of the
Holsteiners by an irregular fire soon after midnight,
which kept the men under arms, and in some degree
fatigued them before the battle itself commenced.”

It is unnecessary to reproduce here Russell’s narra-
tive of the battle. But it is worth while to remark that
probably because he was conscious that he was
expressing himself in unfamiliar terms, he allowed
himself less freedom in his writing than he had
allowed himself in much of his previous work. We
miss the flexibility, the audacity, and the warm touches
of enthusiasm or indignation which glowed later in his
Crimean pages. At one point in the battle a sudden
and unexpected movement brought him under a hot
fire, and he received a slight flesh wound, which, how-
ever, caused him no serious inconvenience. He was
particularly interested in the aspect and behaviour of
men in the rear of the defeated army : —

“ Groups of men carrying or supporting a wounded
comrade, scarcely able to drag himself along ; others
carrying the dead, and laying them down with singular
care, as if they were only asleep, and might be
awakened by too rough a motion. The tnought
crossed the mind involuntarily that the attention h^ad
been better bestowed on the living, of whom too many
were in sore need of it. There was a deficiency of
wagons to carry the wounded back to Schleswig, and,
moreover, the peasants did not relish the task of driving
so close to the firing. It required something like
threats from the soldiers to get the bauer, as they
call him, who in any circumstances moves but slowly,
under the present ones to move at all. . . . Danish
prisoners began to be brought to the rear, most of
them wounded. In the latter case they were treated

93

i85o] THE BATTLE OF IDSTEDT

as well by their opponents as any of their own com-
rades would have been. They were sent on to
Schleswig as quickly as possible, and often side by
side on the same bundle of straw with a German. In
the midst of national hatred displayed in its fiercest
form there was no trace of individual animosity to be
discovered, nor did a word of insult or reproach pass
between any of the hundreds of the rival races thus
brought into contact. It Seemed as if they both
submitted silently to some overwhelming destiny.”

Russell ends his description with these words : —

“The members of the Holstein Government who
were in Schleswig fled immediately to Kiel. On
hearing that the battle was lost, all the officials also
left the town ; the post-office was shut, _ the doors
locked, and all business suspended. A train of carts,
wagons, tumbrils, and cannon passed slowly through
the town from three till five o’clock, the inhabitants
brought out refreshments for the troops, which they
distributed as they went along. The victory that may
be called the Battle of Idstedt is decisive for the present
of the fate of the Duchies.”

When General Willisen fell back on Rensburg
Russell returned to England. The insurgents spoke
buoyantly of another trial of strength, but Russell had
made no mistake in calling the Battle of Idstedt
decisive. They had been under-officered from the
start, and they had no means of repairing their losses.
A few volunteers from Germany came, and the vacan-
cies could have been filled in a day if the Prussian
Government had supported the movement; but the
German States were more inclined to send lint and
oranges than officers. Germans would willingly dance
at a ball of which the profits were to be given to the
Schleswig-Holstein military hospitals, or take a ticket
in a lottery for the same purpose, but they would not
make good in any other way their unwise and

94 THE DANISH WAR OF 1850 [Chap. VIII.

misleading denunciation of Denmark before the war.
The “ first, fine careless rapture ” had passed and was
never to be recaptured. Jacob Grimm might denounce
his countrymen for spending money freely to see
Rachel act while they could not find a groschen for
the Schleswig-Holsteiners, but the truth was that the
cause of the insurgents was never strictly a German
national cause.

CHAPTER IX

EXPERIENCES OF A DESCRIPTIVE REPORTER

At the beginning of September, 1850, Russell was
instructed by Delane to go to Cherbourg for a great
French naval review before the President, Louis
Napoleon. On arriving there he put off to the
Admiralty yacht Lightning, where he was kindly
received by Sir Thomas Cochrane, Sir Charles Napier,
Captain Hall, Captain Rodney Mundy and Captain
Seymour.

“The docks,” he writes, “astonished my friends,
and the fleet and the fortifications made them uneasy.
They were surprised at the size and power of the
steam battleships, and the appearance of the crews
and armaments. Mundy was the only one, I think,
who deprecated in a very stately manner the idea of
any French armament being formidable. The Presi-
dent reviewed the troops, who seemed as good as any
I had ever seen. A banquet followed in the evening,
very ill-managed, immense confusion, little attend-
ance, and less to eat. I was very glad to get some
bread and cheese on board the Lightning late at'
night”

Two days later, after breakfast, Russell went on
board the Portsmouth, which seemed, he tells us, as
though she would be blown out of the water with the
salutes when the President boarded the Admiral’s
flagship. The ships burst into an uproar of a hundred
guns apiece fired as fast as the gunners could serve
them. Glasses were smashed in the cabins, earth and
sea shook ; but there turned out to be no justification

96 A REPORTER’S EXPERIENCES [Chap. IX.

of Napier’s warning to "look out for tompions” which
were said to be frequently fired off by French sailors
in a hurry.

For the ball that evening Russell’s name had been
included in the list of guests sent in to the mairie, but
when the invitations arrived on board the Lightning
there was none for him. The secretary wrote that
anyone with the Admiral whose name was not included
would only have to go in uniform and in company
with one of the officers. But Russell had no uniform.
He went ashore, however, under the wing of Sir
Charles Napier, and the sequel must be given in his
own words : —

" As the tide had fallen the boat could not get to the
stairs ; the sailors jumped out and took Sir Charles on
their shoulders, and he was carried ignominiously to
shore, his trousers half-way up his legs displaying
white socks and ankle jacks. Nor was his appearance
improved by a fall on the causeway. I was landed
next and made my way between a double row of
infantry. At the pavilion an officer stepped forward
and took from me Sir Charles Napier’s visiting card,
which had been given to me in case of an emergency.
Then in a stentorian voice he announced ‘ Le contre-
Amiral Sir Charles Naypeel ’ ‘Non, Monsieur,’ said
I ; ‘je suis seuleraent I’ami du contre-Amiral,’ and in a
second I heard myself proclaimed as ‘ L’ami du contre-
Amiral Sir Charles Naypee.’ Voice after voice re-
peated it ; the sound seemed to fill the welkin, and as
I entered the grand hall with every desire to sink
through the floor, or fly through the roof, every eye
turned on the visitor so strangely heralded. But I’ami
du contre-Amiral passed a very pleasant night among
most agreeable people whom I never met again, and
who were very anxious to see ‘ votre ami le contre-
Amiral.’ ”

Next day the French fleet manoeuvred, and again
the English officers were by no means set at ease by

1 850 ] FRENCH NAVAL REVIEW

97

what they saw ; but they consoled themselves by dis-
cussing possible plans for the attack of Cherbourg.
In the evening they dined with the President on board
the Valmy. Russell, who was left to dine quietly with
one officer on board the Lightning, appears to have
been so much absorbed by the illuminations that he
forgot to bring off some of his clothes which he had
left at the hotel on shore. No sooner had the Admirals
returned than orders were given to start for Ports-
mouth, and Russell had to abandon his property — ^not
the only time in his career when he betrayed an
aptitude for becoming separated from his kit. Sir
Thomas Cochrane and Sir Charles Napier carried on
an ardent discussion late into the night, in which Sir
Charles Napier, we learn, was “ always the aggressor
or rather persecutor.”

“ He always,” says Russell, “ addressed Sir Thomas
Cochrane as 'Your Excellency,’ and was very pro-
voking, like a Dandy Dinmont attacking a St
Bernard.”

When the yacht was steaming to her moorings at
Portsmouth early the next morning. Admiral Napier
was still as vivacious as ever in disputation, engaging
Seymour and others, but Russell observed that Sir
Thomas Cochrane, feeling unequal to the contest, gave
him a wide berth.

"Cochrane, however, had a delicious moment of
revenge; Napier was dilating on the merits of the
Sidon, which he had designed, and was pointing out
her superior capacity as a fighting ship to anything
they had seen, when Captain Petley indiscreetly broke
in with ‘ I beg your pardon, sir ; that is not the Sidon,
that is the Retribution.' The idea of the Admiral not
knowing his own ship was very agreeable to the
company.”

K. — VOL. r.

H

98 A REPORTER’S EXPERIENCES [Chap. IX.

On Russell’s return to London he was greeted with
the news that the Sunday Chronicle, in which he had
embarked a little of his very little fortune, was in a
desperate condition. Bankruptcy was inevitable. One
of the proprietors indeed tried to make a bankrupt of
the other, and when the case came into Court a casual
observation by the defendant that he was placed in
that predicament because he would not listen to the
attempts of Mr. George Hudson to bribe the paper,
produced a most unexpected effect The Railway
King had been dethroned ; he stood in a modern
pillory exposed to the jeers of those whom his
former bounty had fed. The Times came out with
a leading article against the practices which were
laid to his charge, in bribing the Press to conceal
his evil deeds. Russell says that to the best of
his belief there was not the smallest ground for
the accusation against the Sunday Chronicle. But the
Times article provoked still further the dissensions
of the partners, and threats of corporal chastise-
ment and cartels of defiance eventually ended in
proceedings at Bow Street, where the partners
were bound over to keep the peace. Thus was
heralded the crash of the unfortunate journal which
at one time had every appearance of a prosperous
career.

The indignation against Hudson was overwhelmed
only by the rising tide of indignation against the
Pope’s aggression. The odium theologicum was un-
usually bitter, and the war between Low Church,
Broad Church, and Ritualists was conducted with
unrelenting severity. In December, 1850, Russell
accompanied a deputation from the Universities to
present a no-Popery address to the Queen at Windsor.

99

i85o] FOUNDING A NEWSPAPER

Thackeray at this time used to repeat to Russell with
great delight Hook’s lines: —

“ See what a pretty public stir, they’re making down at Exeter
About this surplice fashion.

For me, I little know nor care, whether a parson ought to wear
A black dress or a white dress.

Plagued with a trouble of my own, a wife who preaches in
her gown,

And lectures in her nightdress.’’

Soon afterwards Russell seriously turned his atten-
tion to the founding of a new newspaper in Dublin.

“The want of a sound Conservative organ,” he
writes, “had struck me when last in Ireland. The
Dublin Evening Mail^ the great Orange champion, had
ceased to fight There had already been some
correspondence with paper-makers and steam-press
manufacturers and ^«asf-capitalists, but there was no
result till very late in the year.”

Early in December Mr. Grierson, the Queen’s
printer, had written to Russell that he would like to
see him. Mr. Grierson had said that he had been
induced to entertain the idea of a new newspaper
because he had heard that Russell would edit it.
Russell had explained that he could not mortgage his
future without some guarantee. “ Will you take £soo
a year?” “Certainly not” After these opening
strokes the greater part of the night had been spent
in talk. Several interviews followed, and at last the
elements of an agreement were found. Russell sug-
gested that the paper be called the Daily Express, and
proposed Francis as editor. Francis was to have
£Soo a year, and he himself, as London correspondent,
;^40o. A good staff of correspondents was collected,
and the final arrangements were made before the year
closed. Francis had some difficulty in leaving Cook,

100 A REPORTER’S EXPERIENCES [Chap. IX.

of the Morning Chronicle^ but eventually all difficulties
disappeared, and with rather a modest capital the
Daily Express was launched in February, 1851.

“ The work of the new newspaper,” Russell writes
in his autobiography, “ taxed nae very heavily. I was
obliged in the morning to wait till the first papers
were brought to my cha.mbers, go through them,
write my letter, and nave it delivered at a quarter to
eight at W. H. Smith’s in the Strand, and then I had
to look over parliamentary papers, blue books and
the like, and prepare^ another letter to post in the
evening. And in addition to all this I was charged
with watching over the rise and progress of the
Crystal Palace and the Great Exhibition of 1851.”

All this time he certainly applied his mind much
more seriously to journalism than to the Bar, yet if
he had been asked he would probably have said that
journalism was not his end but his means. Beetham,
his best attorney friend, as he calls him, had given
him a brief in the Common Pleas, “ Bird v. Bennett
and others.” The case was fixed for a certain day in
February, 1851; Russell went down to Court a little
late, in the conviction that his senior would be there.
His senior had been under exactly the same impression
as regards Russell. The case had already been called
when Russell arrived, and judgment had gone against
him. An angry letter from Beetham gave him to
understand that it was not likely he would be entrusted
with more business.

Two or three months later the disaster of “ Bird v.
Bennett ” had apparently soaked into his mind, and he
assured himself that though he could make a living
either as a barrister or a journalist, he could not con-
tinue to be both. As though to bum his boats he
returned a thirty-guinea brief to its sender, and

i8si] THE NEEDLE GUN loi

applied himself to the work which the Times was
giving him in an ever-increasing quantity. He notes in
his diary that an account of Greenwich Fair as seen in a
rainstorm procured him a line of praise from Dickens,
who later repeated the encouragement when he read the
account of a masque ball at Vauxhall on Derby day.

Among the hotchpotch of experiences he had at this
time he was specially interested in a visit to Lord
Ranelagh’s at Fulham, where a party assembled to
watch some experiments with firearms. Amongst
these was a needle gun exhibited by a Prussian named
Dreyse.* It was fired with great rapidity, but it was
considered too clumsy and even dangerous. Russell,
however, directed particular attention to it in the
Times, and several years later, in the Austro-Prussian
War, had the gratification of remembering that he had
predicted that in every sense the weapon would make
some noise in the world.

In July there was a ball at the Guildhall, at which
the Queen was present and for which the Times was
refused a ticket. A personal invitation was sent to
Russell, however, who wrote an account of the ball ;
but he mentions in his diary as an instance of Delane
standing on his dignity that the account was not
published in the Times.

In the autumn Kossuth, the Hungarian patriot,
visited England, and Delane informed Russell that
he wished him to be his guardian, so to speak, on
-behalf of the Times and accompany him wherever he
went. Russell made several vain visits to South-
ampton before Kossuth appeared, but he had the
advantage meanwhile of making the acquaintance of

* Dreyse had invented his muazle-loading needle gun in 1827, and
the breech-loader in 1836.

102 A REPORTER’S EXPERIENCES [Chap. IX.

Pulszky * and his wife and learning something of the
struggle of which Kossuth, if not the hero, was the
Demosthenes and the victim. The Times did not
bid Kossuth welcome, but the heart of the people
seemed to go out to him, and the reception at South-
ampton on October 22 nd was enthusiastic. Russell
remarks that “ all the waifs and strays of the world
appeared to be there.” He did not include under
that title, however, Mr. Cobden, or Mr. Wikoff, who
begged Russell to describe him in his report to the
Times as a “ Publicist.” The publicist (afterwards
well known on both sides of the Atlantic as the
“ Chevalier,” a most industrious emissary of the New
York Herald) introduced Russell to Mr. Walker,
Secretary of State for the United States, “whom,”
said he in a loud whisper, " you should know, as he
is certain to be President,” and to other distinguished
Americans who had come to Southampton to do
honour to a Republican who was also a rebel.

The sight of Kossuth in his picturesque clothing —
albeit he wore a simple tunic and cloak, by no means
glittering with the lace which Hungarian magnates
affect in full dress — his graceful bearing and gestures,
took London by storm, and he pressed his conquest
home with his wonderful gift of speech. It was with
a sense of singular freshness and quaintness that men
heard him urge passionately the principles of political
freedom in the language of Shakespeare and the
Authorised Version of the Bible.

“I confess,” writes Russell, “that Kossuth quite
fascinated me personally, and he was exceedingly

* Pulszky was one of the patriots of 1848. He had been sent by
Kossuth on a confidential mission to Kn^land, Afterwards he lived
in England and became a popular writer.

KOSSUTH’S ENGLISH

103

1851]

gracious in his conversation. In order to establish
a community of feeling between us, he told me that
he had been engaged on the Press and t^t he had
made strenuous efforts to earn his own living as a
reporter. From the outset the Times discredited him,
but the Patriot showed no animosity.”

The English people, on the other hand, were
exceedingly indignant, and Russell was obliged to
see the Times burned in effigy before his eyes.

Kossuth used to tell Russell how, when he was in
exile and resolved on coming to England, he began
in an original way to learn English. He provided
himself with a dictionary and Shakespeare and set
to work.

“ I got on all right as far as the appearance of the
master in the first scene of ‘The Tempest,’ and spent
almost a day over the stage directions, ‘ a ship-master
and a boatswain severally.’ How could mat be?
But a few lines further on I was still more puxzled
by ‘yarely.’ I could not find it in my dictionary,
anymore than I could find ‘yare.’ It was a terrible
ordeal, but I worked away and guessed the sense of
the words. Nevertheless I was a fortnight before
I turned over that p^e and got to the end of the first
short scene in ‘ The Tempest’ ”

He told Cobden that English lent itself to his
thoughts with great readiness. He never trusted him-
self, however, to make an extempore speech, but always
wrote out what he had to say in a close, angular hand.
His visit meant particularly heavy work for Russell.
There was wild enough enthusiasm when Kossuth
visited Manchester, but even that was exceeded at
Birmingham, and Russell always remembered the
strain of describing those great gatherings and dinners,
reporting the immensely long speeches and writing
in special trains what would nowadays be sent by
telegraph.

104 A REPORTER’S EXPERIENCES [Chap. IX.

“ Kossuth,” he writes, “ was much disappointed ;
he believed that Palmerston would take him up, and it
was only due to the protests of his colleagues that
Palmerston did not do so. It seemed to Kossuth
the most reasonable course in the world for England
to declare war on Austria and on Russia, which had
stepped in to save the Austrian Monarchy and to
crush a dangerous insurrection on her own frontier ;
and he was chagrined to find that the popular excite-
ment had little reflection in the political world. In
fact, he could not reconcile himself to the indifference
of politicians generally, and could not credit the degree
of their ignorance of the quarrel between Hungary
and the House of Hapsburg.”

Russell suggested to Kossuth that he should give
in his speeches some account of the military opera-
tions. Kossuth, however, seemed to know but little
of the fighting, or perhaps he was averse from speaking
of it. Even Cobden, who approved of Russell’s
suggestion, was rather astonished at Kossuth’s want
of enthusiasm about the Hungarians who had made
so gallant a fight.

“ I believe,” says Russell, “ there was general relief
among the leaders of both political parties when
Kossuth went away.”

Russell never knew in these days what Delane
might require him to undertake next. One day it was
a trial trip in a new steamer, on another it was a law
report, on another a theatrical criticism ; and all the
time he had to keep going his London correspondence
for the Dublin Daily Express and, temporarily at all
events, contributions to the Independance Beige and
the Edinburgh Witness.

CHAPTER X

THE FIELDING AND THE GARRICK

In those days of, busy life in London before Russell
arrived at the turning point in his life, which was the
Crimean War, he relied much for his recreation on the
Fielding and Garrick Clubs. As the Fielding Club is
now no more than a name, it may be as well to explain
its nature. In a long room on the first floor of a
house in Henrietta Street, Covent Garden, the Club
held its sittings— very late sittings— till the seat of
revelry was transferred to the “ Coalhole ” in Maiden
Lane. There the Club dwindled and died.

“ It was very pleasant in its lifetime,” writes Russell,
“ with just a suspicion of the sea-coast of Bohemia
among the habiMs—axiists,, actors, guardsmen, men
about town, and journalists. I forget all about the
committee, entrance, and the subscriptions, but I know
there was a set dinner at some moderate price at six
o’clock, and there was a supper, boundless as to time,
limited as to oysters, grills, lamb’s head, cow heel and
tripe, kidney ci la Massol (so called from a Belgian
singer), and other subtleties of devilry. Supper
would last commonly till the early milkman cast long
shadows on the pavement and the thrush in the public-
house at the comer began to trill its early lay. Each
M. F. C. could take in a friend, and when the opera was
over the room was crowded, every seat at the long
table filled, and amid the noise of glasses, knives,
forks, and tongues, clouds of tobacco smoke poured
out from every window. The existence of the Fielding,
like that of some other clubs, was due to the con-
servatism of the dear old Garrick.

“No more delightful club was ever invented or
maintained for the intercourse of moderately intellec-
tual, entirely convivial, beings than the old Garrick.

THE GARRICK

[Chap. X.

io6

It was Tory of Tory; there was no cornfort for
strangers; they were admitted, indeed, to dine to a
limited number in the parlour, but they were not
permitted to smoke : at least, that was an illicit act
only done by stealth in an obscure hiding of the
bar by special favour of the inimitable Hamblett and

Miss . Miss was really Mrs. Hamblett,

but for some State reasons and Club considerations
the fact was kept dark. But, per contra, the guests
enjoyed the best dinner that could be cooked of the
kind, and admirable wine_. There was on the ground
floor a smoking-room which at the time deserved to be
called famous, for before the schism of 1853-54, otie
might meet there Thackeray, Dickens, Charles Reade,
Wilkie Collins, Talfourd, Kemble, Samuel Lover, and
Macready.”

To Russell’s list of famous names one might add at
least Millais, Trollope, and, of course, Albert Smith
and Jerrold, about both of whom something will be
said presently.

It was at the Garrick that Russell first met Charles
Reade.

“After making his acquaintance,” Russell writes,
“ I met him very often, day and night, year after year,
for a long time, till he gave up his whist and his
dinners, and secluded himself in his ‘ Naboth’s
Vineyard,’ in Albert Terrace, Knightsbridge. But
though we were always very good friends we never

t ot arw ‘ forrarder.’ 1 remember that when I met him
rst, I was introduced by Thackeray in one of the
dressing-rooms. Thackeray described me as one of
the Lord Chamberlains of Jupiter Tonans. Reade,
who was brushing his hair, even then rather scanty,
dropped his brush and held ■ out his hand, s^ing ;
‘ A political, legal, or critical thunderbolt ? If the
latter, I hope Mr. Russell will knock that infernal

T off his perch and send him to Tartarus.’ I soon

found he had many antipathies — before we left the
room, indeed. Titmarsh had left us and gone down-
stairs. Reade asked me ‘Are you a great friend of
Thackeray’s ? ’ ‘I suppose so,’ said I ; ‘ I am very

i8so-3]

CHARLES READE

107

much attached to him, and he is very kind to me.’

‘ You have not known him very long ? ’ he asked. It
is impossible to give an idea of the delicacy of the
insinuation, and yet Reade was not in the least ill-
natured. But he was jealous — or may it not be said
envious ? He had an unappeasable appetite for praise.
Every fragment of praise that was not offered to him
he regarded as a lost quantity — offered to another it
was a robbery. He had a cheerful, robust and simple
confidence in his supremacy as master novelist of the age.

‘ I paint men and women,’ he said, ‘ as they are, and as I
know them to be ; all my stories are real because they
are based on reality, and those who work them out are
flesh and blood of whose existence I have actual proof.’
He dined with me several times, and I met him over
and over again at little Garrick dinners, but if he
indulged in return banquets 1 was not among the elect.
His meals were extraordinary ; I have seen him at the
Club eating a cauliflower flanked by a jug of cream as
first course, and a great salad to follow washed down
by curious drinks of the shandygaff order. He would
drink coffee associated with sweets, black puddings,
and toasted cheese, to the wonder of any spectators.
His dress was peculiar ; he affected large loose vest-
ments and cravatting of the piratical order — knots and
loose ends — and his trousers were balloons of cloth
of the most exuberant proportions. Charles Synge
called him ‘ the ruthless ruffian of the boundless
breeks,’ and spread the report that his clothes were
made out of whole cloth by a sailmaker of his yacht.
But nevertheless he always looked like a gentleman
who had a strange turn in tailoring. His devotion to
whist was absorbing, and as he was not so strong a
player as he supposed and did not like losing, it is a
proof of the force of his passion that he continued for
many years to drop in at the Garrick in the afternoon
for his rubber and to go on again after dinner.

“ He once appeared with a great quarto volume
under his arm as a present to the Club-room.
Members were to record in it remarkable cases of
whist, but it was not much used except for the inser-
tion of chaff. Reade had no pretensions to be con-
sidered a raconteur or a wit ; indeed he was rather

io8

THE GARRICK

[Chap. X.

prosy. Latterly his eccentricity in dress was accen-
tuated ; he wore large flabby, flappy bandit hats and
curious cloaks or capes, even in hot weather ; and he
allowed his beard to grow, and to fall_ in a whitish
mass over his coat. He indulged in enormous,
quaintly-cut shoes, and portentous clubs of wood as
walking-sticks.

“ One day passers-by were attracted by the words,
' Naboth’s Vineyard,’ painted in large letters on the
walls in front of his house at Albert Gate. The
writing was startling in its size and boldness, and the
meaning was rendered clear by a letter in the Daily
Telegraph which set forth the wickedness of some
Board or other which coveted Charles Reade’s house
and desired to buy him out of it for improvements.
He resisted by every means in his power, but it was
many months before the disappearance of the words
from the little wall before his garden plot indicated
that he had prevailed against the aggressor. The
thoroughness of his work resulted very much from a
lack of imagination ; he was an intense realist. It is
a bad word to use, but it is the antithesis of the
idealist, and Reade, though he was incapable of
invention, could take up incidents and situations which
he came across in newspapers and construct a
wonderful framework of words for them; and he
could and would travel far and wide to test statements,
examine authorities, and substantiate incidents of his
stories. He would make a long journey to gain
knowledge of life at sea, of the economy of an
emigrant ship, or of Colonial life, just as he would
apply himself to study diligently the discipline of
prisons and_ the administration of the lunacy laws.
The mechanical industry of his work was exemplified
by the enormous collection of cuttings he made from
newspapers, _ periodicals and books, classed under
proper headings. As a playwright he was more
careful of finish than he was as a novelist. There is
no harm in sa3dng that the experience of the lady to
whom he attributed so much of his happiness, and
whose death plunged him in a depth of sorrow from
which he never emerged, was exceedingly valuable
in producing the strong dramatic situations which

i 8 so -3] DOUGLAS JERROLU 109

gained the eye and ear of the public in his best
dramas.”

Russell wrote in his autobiography the following
account of Douglas Jerrold, which it is convenient to
place here, although some of the incidents referred to
in it happened later than the year which we have
reached in the story of Russell’s life.

‘‘ I have in my time met many wits — Bernal Osborne,
Shirley Brooks, Quin, Percy Doyle, Mark Lemon,
Bayliss, Mayhew, Albert Smith, Whitmore, Johnny
Jones, Lever, Tom Moore, Hicks of Cornwall, Russel
of the Scotsman, as well as celebrities who were the
bright stars of their own particular hemispheres — but
I never knew anyone who fulfilled my idea of a wit
pure and simple, save Douglas Jerrold. _ In many
respects Shirley Brooks was very near — in some he
excelled Jerrold — but for quickness, terseness, and
‘ unexpectedness ’ the latter was never approached.
He never watched for an opportunity or lay low
lurking for puns, though he was not above making
them, but outside the conversation of the moment —
below or above or around it — his wit played like
summer lightning, incessant and various. And yet
so purely ‘ incidental ’ was it that next morning it was
quite impossible to give shape or form to the memories
of the brilliant flashes, or to recollect the points which
he had tipped with fire. In fact, you could no more
remember what had provoked delight or mirth every
minute than you could describe the aurora borealis
or transfer its colour to canvas. ‘ How wonderful
Jerrold was last night I’ ‘Yes, I never heard him in
such form ! ’ ‘ Do you remember what he said when
Mark Lemon complained of John Leech’s throwing
him over?’ ‘No, I can’t quite. But I know it was
capital’ ‘ That’s just my case. How very stupid, to
be sure ! ’ I have heard something like that over and
over again ; I have tried to recall the phrase or word
which convulsed all who heard it, but in vaim Nothing
of his worthy of repeating, or very little, survives,
and that little is so entirely topical that the reproduc-
tion of the bare words has no effect — ^it is like the

no

THE GARRICK

[Chap. X.

remains of a bottle of champagne. _ He was rarely
cruel but it is not in the nature of a wit to be magnani-
mous ; the archer cannot resist a butt ; no master of
the toxophilite’s art, except Shirley Brooks, could ever
refrain from lodging an arrow in the inner red.

I am bound to say Jerrold was quick to pluck out the
dart and ease the hurt if he could.

“ George Hodder came to him one day. i want
vour advice, Douglas— I’m in trouble. The Morning

i has dismissed me!’ ‘You don’t say, my dear

George, they’ve had a gleam of intelligence at last ? ’

‘ Don’t joke, my dear Jerrold, I really want your
advice. I am thinking of going into the coal trade.

‘ Capital 1 You see you’ve got the sack to begin with.’
And then Jerrold went off and procured an engagement
for Hodder, who was a very quaint specimen of what is
called a literary gentleman — or was called so in 1848.

“I may give as an instance of Jerrold’s readiness,
a little quip of his at a dinner I gave soon after my
return from the Crimea. We were waiting for Albert
Smith, and were about to go into dinner without him,
when someone said, ‘ There he is at last ! Here comes
the Monarch of Mountains!’ ‘Yes,’ said Jerrold,

‘ Albert half crowned him long ago.’* ,

“He was not well that night, but he was bright,
witty, and delightful as he usually was when the wine
cups were flowing and he was ainong his friends ; but
there was one pet aversion of his present whom out
of regard and friendship I was obliged to ask — Andrew
Archdeckne, ‘ Archy ’ as he was generally called, the
original of Thackeray’s ‘ Foker. ’ J errold raged against
him and at last exclaimed, ‘ The heehaws of that ass
with the golden hoofs make me ill ; I must go,’ and
off he went. Two or three days after I had an apology
from him for leaving so abruptly; he really had an
attack of ‘ Archyphobia,’ which was subsiding into
bronchitis, and was in the doctor’s hands. Next d^
I drove out to inquire how he was — a long way off,
somewhere on the Finchley Road, I think — and I was

* Albert Smith climbed Mont Blanc, the “ Monarch of Moun-
tains,” at a time when mountaineering was a less skilful science
than now. He lectured on his climb afterwards in London at the
Egyptian Hall, using pictures painted by Telbin, and made much
money by the enterprise. Half-a-crown was the price of admittance.

1850—3]

THACKERAY

III

told he was better, and was then asleep. That night
I started for Edinburgh, to deliver a lecture on the
Crimean War, and a day or two after I was shocked
and grieved to see the news of his death.

“ I have never seen a good likeness of Jerrold.
Perhaps a good miniature painter could have caught
the expression of his eyes and fixed the outlines of
his quivering, mobile mouth, but the photographers
were helpless. They gave indeed a mass of hair
ramped over the brow and turned back in a stream to
the nape of the neck, the shaggy brow, the fine arched
nose, open nostril, the curved thin lips, but the man
Jerrold who coruscated like a firework was not to be
traced on pasteboard.

“ Archdeckne was one of the few men who ventured
to stand up to Thackeray. Thackeray was a sort of
Dictator in the Garrick. Archdeckne was not pleased
with the alleged portrait of him as Foker in ‘ Pen-
dennis,’ and he made it his business to ‘get back’
on Thackeray when he could. His answer, when
Thackeray asked him what he thought of his
lecture on ‘ The Four Georges,’ is familiar — ‘ Capital,
Thack, but it would be improved by a piano.’ When
Archdeckne became High Sheriff of Suffolk it was his
duty to provide for the reception of Cockbum, who
came to Ipswich to preside at the Assizes. Instead of
sending the usual judge’s coach to the station Arch-
deckne sent a cab, and Cockbum (who, by the way,
knew Archdeckne fairly well) solemnly fined him
;^500.”

Of Albert Smith, Russell writes : —

“Albert Smith and Arthur his brother (a much more
original, quaint and pleasant companion) were members
of the Garrick, the former very well known all over
London, if not very popular with the dons of the Club.
About the time of the success of ‘ Mont Blanc ’ at the
Egyptian Hall, I became almost, although not quite,
one of his set, which was very pleasant if a little noisy
and nearly ‘ rowdy.’ I was speedily aware that Albert
was not regardedf by the dei majores of the morning
room as quite the thing. Sir H. Webb alluded to him
as ‘ that bawster — ^no, shawman — doocid noisy fellow,’

II2

THE GARRICK

[Chap. X.

and Tenterderi would not look at his table. But for
all that he was ‘great fun,’ very genial, of infinite
humour, if not of wit, and of amazing energy and good
nature. His voice was strident and high pitched, and
his laugh rang like the clatter of a steam shuttle.
Educated and qualified as a surgeon, he had studied in
Paris and diverted himself in the Quartier Latin, but he
was more apt at making a joke than a pill. He joined in
the rush into literature which the writings of IDickens,
the success of Punch, and the great rage for ‘funni-
ness,’ created and sustained on the stage and in
serial literature. He made a reputation among the
vast crowd of his competitors — the Angus Reachs,
Mayhews, Jerrolds, and Planch6s — by his story of
medical student life, ‘ The Adventures of Mr. Ledbury.’
He had a very pleasant house at Chertsey, where his
mother, and I think his aunt, lived, and there he enter-
tained his friends at intervals with great hospitality.
Generally for the convenience of his many theatrical
intimates, male and female, a tent was erected on
the lawn on Sundays, and this was devoted to an
interminable luncheon-dinner-supper — oysters, lobster
salad, cold fowl, lamb and peas — till it was time to rush
for the last train to Waterloo. But his headquarters
were in an old-fashioned residence in Percy Street off
Tottenham Court Road, and there in a back parlour
he had what was indeed his workshop, in which he
read the papers for the purpose of finding new material
for a line in his patter-song ‘ Galignani Messenger,’ or
for a fresh joke in the text of ‘ Mont Blanc.’ ”

The little house in King Street, where the old
Garrick Club used to be, was a nest of distinguished
minds gathered from all the arts, sciences and pro-
fessions. It is doubtful whether there has ever
been a group of men to compare with it in the clubs
of London, though we do not forget the small Society
of Johnson, Reynolds and Garrick It combined to a
singular degree humour and learning in conversa-'
tion, and was in its various ways a real ornament to
an age of great human advancement — an age too often

“WINKLE” SPORTSMEN

1852]

113

ridiculed on account of certain qualities of dowdiness
and primness which lay on its surface. Thackeray’s
word was generally final in the club. But neither he
nor Dickens was quick in the play of light conversa-
tion. Jerrold’s eminence in this respect was probably
the virtue of his defect, for his spoken word, like
Dr. Johnson’s, was more striking than his written
word. Thackeray’s influence was proved chiefly on
the memorable occasion in 1858, when he induced the
club to expel Edmund Yates on the ground that he
had abused his membership in publishing in a news-
paper a personal description of Thackeray. Yates, in
fact, referred to the broken nose which all Thackeray’s
life remained as the mark of his boyish encoimter with
his friend Venables. ■ But the subject of the old Garrick
must be left here for the moment; the sayings and
doings of certain of its members will be mentioned
more suitably at other stages in Russell’s life.

Russell’s diary of April, 1852, contains a diverting
glimpse of a day’s sport which might have taken place
on “ the sea coast of Bohemia,” but which, as a matter
fact, took place at Watford. Russell writes : —

“X. asked a party to Watford to shoot. There were
only hares and rabbits to be sure, but what more could
be expected in April ? The sportsmen among whom I
had the honour to be numbered were of the Winkle
order: Thackeray, Dickens, John Leech, Jerrold,
Lemon, Ibbotson, and others were invited and
carriages were reserved to Watford. As we were
starting, a written excuse was brought from Dickens to
be conveyed to Mrs. X. by Thackeray. The party
drove up to the house, and, after compliments,
Thackeray delivered the billet. The effect was un-

E leasant. Mrs. X. fled along the hall, and the guests
eard her calling to the cook, ‘ Martin, don’t roast the
ortolans ; Mr. Dickens isn’t coming.’ Thackeray smd
he never felt so small. ‘ There’s a test of popularity

K, — VOL. I.

1

THE GARRICK

[Chap. X.

1 14

for you ! No ortolans for Pendennis I ’ The shooting !
A dozen rabbits and half-a-dozen hares, bagged and
let out one after the other, to be hit or missed ; several
of the miserables dragged their well-peppered hinder
parts into the coverts.”

On May ist Russell attended the Royal Academy
dinner. He writes : —

“ The card was sent to me personally, and I was
greatly pleased to be the first of my order ever admitted.
It was a most interesting occasion : the Duke of
Wellington, Lord Derby, Lord John Russell, Lord
Lansdowne, Lord Grey, Lord Palmerston, Macaulay,
Dickens, Thackeray. 1 he Duke’s speech made a sensa-
tion. The hearts of the people had been greatly moved
by the heroism of the officers and men in the shipwreck
of the Birkenhead. When the Duke rose to return
thanks for the Army, all eyes observed how deeply he
was moved. He spoke in measured sentences. ‘ Both
services,’ said he, ‘ but particularly the Army, have
been involved in great disasters, but I don’t doubt,
gentlemen, but it will turn out that the approbation of
this company is founded upon a just estimate of the
manner m which the troops in the Birkenhead have
performed their duty, that the utmost order, subordina-
tion and discipline prevailed, which has been as
satisfactory to me as it must have been to you.’
After the cheering which followed the Duke’s words
respecting the safety of the women and children on
board, and the noble attitude of the soldiers who kept
their ranks whilst the Birkenhead was slowly sinking,
the Duke concluded : ‘ This, gentlemen, is a proud fact
for the Services of this country.’” Many years after-
wards Russell wrote : — “Those who heard the Duke
that evening little thought that the great soldier, whose
words elevated his hearers’ hearts with pride and
confidence, would have passed into the Valhalla of
British History ere a year was out, and that the Army
of which he uttered such a noble eulogy would he
called upon less than three years afterwards to justify
his words in the ordeal of a stormy winter in open
trenches before the great Russian fortress of Sebas-
topol.”

CHAPTER XI

MORE EXPERIENCES OF A REPORTER

About this time a ukase went forth from Delane’s
room, which condemned the staff of the Times to late
hours,

“From ten o’clock,” says Russell, “one must be
there, awaiting orders and looking out for squalls till
such time as the order of release is delivered. No
one has seen so many sunrises in London as Delane ;
he takes a pure delight in walking out of Printing
House Square to Blackfriars Bridge and looking at
London in the early morning. Then he saunters to
his house in Serjeants’ Inn and settles down to rest,
having first sent off all the necessary letters to leader
writers and reporters.”

Russell was fond of telling a story that “ once while
Serjeants’ Inn was in the hands of the painters Delane
took lodgings in a quiet street, and presently attracted
the notice of an old lady who lived opposite and was
fond of early rising. She watched morning after
morning the mystenous lodger arrive regularly while
the street was still and let himself in with a latch-key.
About midday people of suspicious appearance with
strange-looking parcels began to call ; they were
shown in, and after a few minutes departed. They
came in cabs and on foot. After a week or ten days
the old lady had accumulated overwhelming evidence,
and proposed an interview with a detective. He came,
and she laid before him her observations in detail.
The detective agreed with her that there was need for
investigation. The next day he appeared with the
information that the gentleman she suspected as an
accomplished criminal was the editor of the Times."*

* It is only right that the editor of the Tims should appear as the
original of a story which has since been told of other jonmalists.

MORE EXPERIENCES [Chap. XL

ii6

In the summer of 1852 an episode, in which J. M.
Langford, very much against his will, was the principal
figure, was stage-managed in the Garrick Club, and
may be given as characteristic of the more practical,
rather the more violent, humour of Bohemian life. We
have the narrative in Russell’s own words : — *

“J. M. Langford, commonly known as Joe, was,
among other things, the theatrical critic of the Observer
— a kindly, ill-informed, dullish man, full of affections
and aspirations, which he in somewise fulfilled ; cer-
tainly nappy in the attachment of his own set. He
was sometimes ‘haughty.’ To him in the Garrick
comes Albert Smith one afternoon. ‘Hallo, Joe, who
has cut your hair ? ’ Joe was in a dignified mood ; there
was an Honourable and Reverend Fitzroy Stanhope
reading the paper near at hand ; my Lord Tenterden
was airing his handkerchief at the window. Langford
replied, ‘ I really don’t see how it can interest you who
cut my hair.’ Albert went downstairs and stood in the
hall. The next member who came up to the morning-
room sauntered up to Langford with : ‘ How do you do ?
I see you’ve been having your hair cut ! Who did it ? ’
Joe very sternly replied, ‘ I really can’t imagine why
you ask me.’ Then he ordered a glass of sherry and
bitters. The waiter brought it and gave a little start
of surprise as he presented it with a ‘ Beg pardon, sir ! ’
which provoked Joe to ask, ‘ What do you mean ? ’
‘It’s along of your 'air, sir. It looks unusual’ Joe
went to the glass and could see nothing remarkable,
but as he was considering his face Charles Taylor
burst upon him with ‘ "V^ere on earth did you get
your hair cut, my dear Langford ? ’ Joe could stand
It no longer. He went off to his chambers in Ra3rmond
Buildings, Gra3^s Inn.

“Next morning he saw an advertisement in the
Times: * J. M. L. Say who cut it. Was it your own
hand or the deed of another ? Confess ere it be too
late,’ It was only the first of a series of similar
announcements, and the ingenuity of his tormentors

• The incident, described a little differently, also appears in Sir
J. Crowe’s “ Reminiscences.”

A PRACTICAL JOKE

1852]

1 17

devised continual surprises for him. On the day he
Avent down to Chertsey Races he saw the walls
placarded with enormous posters, yellow and black :
‘ J. M. L. Once more, who cut it? You must speak I ’
A band of Ethiopian minstrels was furnished with a
melody to sing outside Raymond Buildings to the air
of ‘ What are the wild waves saying ? ’ then very
popular. And the refrain was —

‘ What are de wild waves saying as dey lap de Waterloo stair ?
What are dem wild waves sa)dng ? — Dey say who cut Joe’s hair ? ’

He was persecuted with diabolical persistence, and as
the time of his annual Continental tour came near he
sullenly retired from the club and was seen no
more.

“Just before he left, a friend, of whose name I am
not sure, called on him and asked him to take charge
of a small parcel for Jean Tairraz, the guide at
Chamoimix, where he had announced his intention of
going. Joe agreed willingly and on arriving at the
H6tel de Londres sent for Tairraz and gave him the
parcel. Next day he set out on one of the usual
excursions and toiled up to the Cascade des Pelerins.
As he reached the little plateau he saw an enormous
yellow poster with black letters plastered on the rock
in front of him. ‘ J. M. L. Confess ! Reveal I Or be
for ever lost ! Who cut it ? ’ He was furious. But
wherever he turned day after day the legend was
before him. The parcel he had taken consisted of
posters, with a note from Albert Smith to Tairraz
requesting him to have them put at every' Schauplatz
around Chamounix. Joe’s spirit was broken. He sat
down and wrote an humble letter to Albert Smith. ‘ I
yield. Spare me. My hair was cut in St. Martin’s
Court, at the barber’s on the left hand side. His
charge was id. I am quite beaten.’ ”

Every generation has its standard of humour,
influenced as much, perhaps, by reaction as by any
original theory. At all events, there was the voice
of authority in the middle of the last century for
holding the practical joke to be the pure metal of fun.

ii8 MORE EXPERIENCES [Chap. XL

If that point be conceded, a high tribute must neces-
sarily follow to the perfect elaboration with which the
joke at Langford’s expense was carried out.

When Russell was able to get away for a holiday in
this summer of 1852, he went to the Alps with Albert
Smith. Albert Smith would not have proposed to
climb Mont Blanc again if a guide had not informed
him that two Englishmen were forming parties for the
ascent, and it would be a good opportunity, for reasons
of comfort and economy, if he and Russell joined one
of these parties. The two Englishmen were Rob Roy
MacGregor* and Mr. Leopold Shuldham, each of
whom had a retinue of porters, the first a small and
the latter a large one. On the day of the start both
parties climbed to the Grands Mulets, where they
were to sleep till it was light enough to go on. Russell
and Albert Smith did not reach the summit, but
descending to the Grands Mulets, they heard that
Shuldham and MacGregor had done so. When the
victorious tourists returned from their climb, they
were received with salutes of cannon and with cheers
from the people and the visitors at the hotels.

“Shuldham,” says Russell, “was the first to reach
the summit, and he was in the act of drinking a glass
of champagne, which the guide had brought, when
Rob Roy, who had followed in his tracks, arrived
without great difficulty and with only a couple of
porters. Much elated, Rob Roy exclaimed : ‘ Here we
are at last! I shall be very grateful for a glass of
champagne if you have any to spare.’ Shuldham,
irritated W the familiar manner of his competitor,
bowed stiffly and said : ‘ I beg your pardon, sir, but
I have not the pleasure of your acquaintance.’ This
became a pet phrase with us for the rest of the journey.

* John MacGregor, philanthropist, and the hero of many adven-
turous journeys in a “ Rob Roy " canoe.

i8S2] WELLINGTON’S FUNERAL 119

A more generous, kindly, and companionable man
than Leopold Shuldham never existed, but he had
then a high Eton and Christchurch manner upon him,
and could not put up with familiarity, even on the top
of Mont Blanc.”

At the end of a day’s tramp in this holiday, Russell
received a letter from London requesting his immediate
return to write an account of the public funeral of the
man whom Queen Victoria described as “Britain’s
pride, her glory, her hero, the greatest man she has
ever produced.”

“Often and often,” writes Russell, “had I stopped
in the street and taken off my hat as the well-known
figure of the Duke of Wellington caught the eye as he
rode from the Horse Guards to the House of Lords ;
the thin form in the plain blue frock coat, with white
stock and buckle showing above the neck, and white
duck trousers strapped over the boots which bore his
name. Never, as far as I could see, did he omit to
raise his right hand to the brim of his hat as a return
to the salutations of the people.”

The day before the funeral Russell went to St
Paul’s, and was shown his seat by Dean Milman, but
his principal concern was how he was to get there from
Bedford Row, where he was then living. Thinking did
not increase his confidence. He was alarmed at the
possibility of failing to arrive upon such an occasion.

“ I had a sleepless night,” he writes, “ and before
dawn a dull noise, like that of the surf beating on a
distant shore, came through the night air ; it was the
tramp of feet in the direction of St Paul’s. The jobT
master in the neighbouring mews had asked £8 for
a brougham or a cab, and he had come to me later
to say that he could not drive me for less than ;£'io
and compensation for damages to horse or vehicle.”

Russell preferred to go on foot, and crossing
Lincoln’s Inn Fields, came into Fleet Street, where

120 MORE EXPERIENCES [Chap. XI.

he joined the main current flowing towards St.
Paul’s.

In his own words, “it was full, it was strong, but
it was not rapid. As the boom of the guns, fired to
mark the progress of the funeral car, reached the ears
of the vast mass that filled the streets, there was a
movement as though the multitude had become a living
entity, with every muscle vibrating, as though it formed
a great python.’’

Twelve days after the conqueror of Waterloo was
laid in his grave, as Russell does not fail to remark in
his diary, all the churches in Paris were ringing for
the new Napoleon who was proclaimed Emperor.

Only one other memory of this famous occasion
need be abstracted from Russell’s diaries : —

“ Before the funeral procession entered the Cathedral,
a Russian general separated himself from the ambassa-
dors, diplomatists and generals, who represented the
Great Powers, stalked down the nave between the
lines of the Guards, examining the men, their accoutre-
ments, the fittings of their belts and pouches, and even
their boots ; and once he stood alongside a Grenadier,
who was like himself, a man of great stature, and
having made the inspection up and down, he returned
to his place smiling and nodding. The next time
I saw General Prince Gortschakoff was at the great
ball in the Kremlin, in September, 1856, after the
coronation of the Czar. He it was who commanded
the army that marched out of Sebastopol."

Varied as were the experiences into which reporting
had brought him,* Russell added quite a new one to
his list in 1853. A reporter may indeed regard himself
as a collector, and Russell must have been proud of
placing in his collection so singular a specimen as

* Sir Joseph Crowe, in his " Reminiscences,” says that Russell
had only one rival “ as a descriptive reporter,” and that was Angus
Reach.

1853 ] A DINNER OF LUNATICS

I2I

the following episode. He attended a dinner of the
“Alleged Lunatics’ Friends Society” at the Free-
masons’ Tavern, at which a well-known philanthropist,
Mr. Hansard, was in the chair. Russell’s right-hand
neighbour was “a silent, gentlemanlike man,” while
on his left was a voluble person who struck up
acquaintance with him immediately. During the
dinner the left-hand man whispered, “ Look out for
that fellow on the right, I know him well, he is as
mad as a March hare, and would stick a knife into you
in a moment” All went well until the gentleman
immediately opposite Russell took an epergne filled
with fruit and put it on his plate. This created a little
disturbance between him and his neighbour. When
the chairman stood up to give the first toast, he was
rather thrown off his balance by the crowing of a cock
amidst the general cheers.

With the concert which followed the speeches came
the climax Henry Russell, the composer, made an
unhappily appropriate selection in giving as his song
“The Maniac.” The first verse was interrupted by
confused outcries, but when he came to the pitiful
refrain of the maniac, “ Oh, release me ! Oh, release
me! By Heavens! I am not mad,” Russell’s left-
hand neighbour with surprising agility jumped on the
table flourishing a dessert-knife and shouting, “ No,
by Heavens! No, by Heavens! We are not mad!”
His example was followed by several others, who,
in spite of the expostulations of the chairman and the
soothing effects of the less mad to restrain them,
sang “We are not mad.” Russell’s right-hand neigh-
bour looked at him in an unfriendly way because he
had laid hold of the leg of the man who was dancing
in front of him and kicking over the glasses.

122

MORE EXPERIENCES [Chap. XL

“ In the midst of the confusion,” says Russell, “ I
glided to the door, got my hat and coat, and went to
the office, where Delane was exceedingly amused by
my adventure. I learned that after I had left, the
police had to be called in, and Hansard and the
Committee escaped with difficulty.”

In his diary of 1853 Russell communes with himself
severely on the subject of his income, which was not
increasing in proportion as the demands upon it
unquestionably were. Looking with a scrutinising
eye upon the facts, he had to confess that when he had
allowed for the necessary expenses of his work — he
had to delegate some of his correspondence — his
income from the Times, the Dublin Daily Express,
and the Independance Beige together was barely £600
a year. He was performing the feat known as out-
running the constable. For the part of the house in
Bedford Row, which was occupied by himself and his
family, he paid ;6'ioo a year, and he had further to pay
something to the friendly barrister who allowed him
to write his name on the door.

“ Mr. W ,” writes Russell, “ the senior of a

firm of solicitors in Bedford Row, was an amiable
gentleman who had a handsome house in Regent’s
Park, and horses and carriages, and such other
luxuries as a flourishing attorney would desire. But
he had one drop in his cup : he had no children, and
after I had been a few days in residence, he made
friends with my children who- lived over his head, and
very soon he had a speaking acquaintance with their
parents. There were now two boys and two girls
who had come in regular succession a year and ten
months after each other, and it was difficult to say

which engaged Mr. W 's attention more, the elder

girl or the younger boy. A substantial advantage, as
the result of our intimacy, was the reduction of my
rent from ;£’ioo to £Zq a year. When I passed his
door about ten o’clock in the day I saw placed on the

SAYERS AND HEENAN

123

i860]

table a decanter of water and a tumbler, a brown roll
on a plate and a small pat of butter. That was his
luncheon year after year, and when he had eaten it he
read for ten minutes something from Herbert’s poems
or a chapter in the Bible; and he died very much
lamented, with thousands of pounds in the bank,
leaving a most amiable widow and a multitude of
friends to mourn him._

“ Imagine my astonishment, one day after I left
Bedford Row, to see him in an unexpected place.
I was staying with a friend at Aldershot, when I heard
a commotion in the camp, and presently a young fellow
dashed into the tent saying: ‘Sayers and Heenan are
fighting not far from here. If you come at once you
will be in time.’ I saw the end of the famous en-
counter which my colleague Woods made immortal in
the Times. Among those who hurried along with the
crowd that escorted the two battered boxers to the
railway, I saw my former landlord, with glowing
cheeks and eyes bright with excitement.”

CHAPTER XII

THE CRIMEAN WAR: PRELIMINARIES

At the beginning of 1854, which was to be perhaps
the most eventful year in his life, Russell had no more
idea of seeing a war of the first magnitude and being
once again, and in a much more important sense than
before, a war correspondent, than the British Govern-
ment had that war was at hand when they began to
interest themselves in the dispute between Louis
Napoleon and the Czar Nicholas concerning the Holy
Places. As he was sitting at his desk in the Times
office one evening in February, he was informed that
Delane wished to see him, and on entering the room
was astonished by the announcement that a very
agreeable excursion to Malta with the Guards had
been arranged for him. The Government had resolved
to show Russia that England was in earnest in sup-
porting the Sultan against aggression, and that if
necessary she would send an expedition to the East.
Lord Hardinge had promised an order for Russell’s
passage with the Guards from Southampton, and
everything would be made as easy and as comfortable
for him as possible. Handsome pay and allowances
would be given. When Russell offered some objec-
tion to losing his practice at the Bar— for after all, he
had not brought himself to the point of refusing
occasional briefs when he had time for them— Delane
said, “ There is not the least chance of that ; you will be
back at Easter, depend upon it, and you will have a
pleasant trip."

“A PLEASANT TRIP”

12,5

1854]

Russell let himself be persuaded. Thus he expresses
it in his diary ; but the words are to be read, one fancies,
in the diplomatic sense in which he probably spoke to
Delane. Absence abroad is no doubt a sacrifice in
several ways, yet it cannot be supposed that it would
have been worth Russell’s while seriously to postpone
an important commission in journalism to his rare
legal engagements.

On the eve of his departure, on February 19th, 1854,
several of his friends gave him a farewell supper at
the Albion. Among the company were Dickens,
Douglas Jerrold, Mark Lemon, Thackeray, James
O’Dowd and Albert Smith. Some verses composed in
his honour were sung amid the enthusiasm which is
indulgently accorded to doggerel in such circum-
stances ; and these particular verses fell below even
the standard observed by the warm-hearted but
inefficient rhymesters who generally step in on
valedictory occasions

The Guards left London on February 22nd. Rus-
sell’s permission to sail with them had not arrived
when he went on board the transport Ripon at South-
ampton, although he had a letter of introduction from
Lord Hardinge. Brigadier Bentinck was not there,
and Russell was directed to an officer who was super-
intending the skinning of a sheep. Russell declared
himself Colonel Codrington, for he it was, answered,
“ Orders are orders, but the Brigadier must settle this
business. I tell you candidly, Mr. Russell, you will
find it very crowded on board. Cannot you go some
other way ? ”

The official permission to sail in the Ripon did not
arrive, and Russell accordingly decided to travel by a
different route to Valetta. Arriving there on March 2nd

126

THE CRIMEAN WAR [Chap. XII.

he presented Lord Hardinge’s letter to the Brigadier
of the Guards, and struck up a useful acquaintance
with his aide-de-camp, Byng.

From Valetta he wrote gossiping letters to London,
passing the time pleasantly enough and being still
unapprehensive of the Sturm und Drang which lay
ahead of him. Readers of Charles Kingsley’s “ Two
Years Ago ” may remember how the feeling of those
days is reflected in Lord Scoutbush’s words, “ I’d get
out to the East away from this dep6t work, and if
there is no fighting there, as everyone says there will
not be, I’d go into a marching regiment and see
service.” Russell did not dissociate himself from the
easy optimism of everyone else. In a letter to his
wife (who had settled in Guernsey with her children)
he said : —

“ I am glad to tell you it is generally believed that
our troops will never see a shot fired, and that the
war, or whatever it is, will be over by the summer.”

One morning, however, a letter from the Times
office agitated him considerably. It informed him
that the Government had determined, in conjunction
with the Emperor of the French, to send a strong force
to Turkey, and that an expeditionary army of the two
allies would advance to aid the Turks on the Danube
unless the Czar retired from the Principalities. The
Cabinet of St Petersburg would assuredly give way
when France and England put forth their power in
defence of the Sultam

"The editor,” writes Russell slyly, "was much
gratified with what I had done, and hoped I would
take such a delightful opportunity of spending a few
more weeks in the East’’

i8S4] ON TO THE DARDANELLES

127

Russell at once visited several officers, who knew
nothing of any forward movement. The Admiral
knew only that the baking ovens at the arsenal were
busy night and day, and that “something is up.”
Soon it became known that Lord Raglan was on his
way to command the army in the field, and that a
move might be made at any moment Russell’s puzzle
now was how he was to move with the rest; they
were provided for, but it was quite another matter for
him. All the ships were in the Government service,
and he had no right to go on board any one of them.
In his bewilderment he went to a friend who held a
high place in the dockyard and told him his difficulties.
The friend said, “ I’ll manage a passage for you all
right, but you must be ready to start at a moment’s
notice, for I can’t tell when the first transport will
go to the Dardanelles.” Russell packed his kit,
engaged a Maltese bodyservant, and rode at single
anchor.

“French men-of-war,” he writes,* “towing sailing
vessels full of Zouaves and Turcos from Algiers, and
infantry from Marseilles, came into port, and Valetta
was crowded with red-breeched infantry and bearded
and turbanned Zouaves.”

“ I would not trust these fellows an inch,” growled
Waddy of the 50th, an old school friend of Russell’s, as
the two looked down on the harbour full of ships flying
the tricolour. “ By Jove I they are quite capable of a
surprise. It’s a shame to let them go about the place

* From papers containing Russel’s reminiscences of the Crimean
War, published in the Army and Navy Gazette, and afterwards
re-pubnshed by Messrs. Routledge, in 1895, under the title of “The
Great War wiSi Russia.” In order to pursue the plan, mentioned
at the_ begin nin g, of making Russell’s biography as far as possible
autobiographical, it has been thought proper to use these papers
freely, often reproducing their exact language.

128

THE CRIMEAN WAR [Chap. XII.

in this way 1 ” " But they are our allies,” said

Russell “ That doesn’t signify,” quoth Waddy.

On the night of March 30th, Russell was at the
Lodge of St Peter and St Paul preparing for initia-
tion, when an orderly thundered at the door and
handed in a slip of paper. The Golden Fleece will be
off at midnight Your berth is all right Get your
things on board at once.” In an hour Russell was on
board the steamer, which was crowded with the
Rifle Brigade. He had no time to look after his
baggage. His Maltese servant looked after it, and
himself. The man had made a piteous appeal for a
small advance of wages to leave “with his wife and
tree little children.” Russell had given it and the man
went ashore, and Russell never saw him again. Thus
Russell started on the morning of March 31st for
Gallipoli without servant or horse, and with a most
exiguous kit

In addition to these obvious causes of anxiety, he
was perplexed by a misunderstanding between him-
self and Mowbray Morris, the manager of the Times,
as to the amount of his salary. He had understood
that he was to receive twelve guineas a week in addition
to his expenses, but his wife had since his departure
been receiving only six gfuineas a week — a sum which
did not compensate him for the losses he incurred by
giving up his other work. It was not till some weeks
afterwards that he learned that his own interpretation
of the agreement with Mowbray Morris had been
unreservedly and cordially accepted by the Times.

General Sir George Brown, in command of the
Light Division, and his staff were on board, and
Russell’s presence was very trying to them. At first
“they could not make it out,” and the captain could

GALLIPOLI

1854]

129

only say that Russell had an order for a passage from
“the proper authorities.”

“Sir George Brown,” says Russell, “was an exceed-
ingly handsome man in uniform fitting like a skin,
with well-cut features, closely shaven, and tightly
stocked. He had a shrewd but not unkindly look, a hot
temper and a Scotch accent People said that in mind,
manner and person he resembled Sir John Moore.”

Russell knew no one when he went on board the
Golden Fleece; later at Gallipoli he had a bowing
acquaintance with Sir George Brown and was on
admirable terms with the Riflemen, to whom he was
indebted for much advice and many services. One lent
him a servant, another gave him books, a third
stationery, and so on. Thinking of them all some forty
years afterwards, he was inclined to doubt whether
the same battalion, “despite cramming and special
classes and examinations,” could turn out a set of
officers more fit for work or better instructed in their
business.

At Gallipoli, where he landed with the Light
Division on April 5th, Russell stayed for some time
amid all the noise and excitement of preparations
for war, seeing a stream of ships, great and little,
arriving and departing, and French and English
generals coming and going. The need to write
frequent letters to the Times, both from Malta and
Gallipoli, was a considerable test of his qualities as
a correspondent. Many journalists in such circum-
stances would have felt that they were out for a war
or nothing; that so long as war did not begin there
was “nothing to write about” Russell perceived
that not only was everything interesting, but every-
thing was relevant Nothing was too small for him

R. ^VOL. I.

130

THE CRIMEAN WAR [Chap. XII.

to notice ; the incidents of the streets, the conversa-
tions of the soldiers, the appearance of the amazingly
mixed population, the scenery, the agriculture, the
flora and fauna. All these things were made the
background of a running narrative of extraordinary
ease and vivacity. This result was not produced, of
course, by mere industry in retailing what he saw ; he
had a scholarly mind, and humour ; the one saved him
from treating small matters without dignity, and the
other made his choice of material perfectly appropriate
and well proportioned. It is not pretended that his
letters had the magic and romance of, say, Kinglake’s
history of the Crimean War. But Kinglake set out to
write an epic with Lord Raglan for his Achilles. This
admirable work of art would have been ill-placed
indeed in a newspaper which required a kind of log-
book of the doings of the Army day by day — a narrative
in which criticism tended to conceal itself, betraying
itself to a watchful eye chiefly in the significance of its
selective processes. Lord Morley of Blackburn has
used the phrase “ the irony of literal statement,” and
that was the sort of irony commonly launched by
Russell against the infamous mismanagement which
became only too familiar later in the Crimea. He
“ reported ” the war, yet in a very genuine sense he
was a critic of astonishing acumen and efficiency. In
encompassing this combination of values, his letters
were a new thing in journalism. They were a model
'’of what such letters should be. Every reader of them
^in the Times felt that he had ^e movements, the
sufferings, the aspirations of the Army — nay, the very
ground on which the troops were camped, presented
before his eyes. . The young “special correspondent ”
of to-day could not do better than read these letters

MISMANAGEMENT

1854]

131

written over half a century ago, and ask himself
whether the first of special correspondents has not
some title to be called also the best

Russell did not leave Gallipoli without having
observed the beginnings of chaos in the British com-
missariat and medical arrangements. On April 8th,
,1854, he wrote to Delane : —

“The management is infamous, and the contrast
offered by our proceedings to the conduct of the
French most painful. Could you believe it — the sick
have not a bed to lie upon ? They are landed and
thrown into a ricketty house without a chair or a table
in it. The French with their ambulances, excellent
commissariat staff and boulangerie, etc., in every
respect are immeasurably our superiors. While these
things go on, Sir George Brown only seems anxious
about the men being clean-shaved, their necks well
stiffened, and waist belts tight He insists on officers
and men being in full fig ; no loose coats, jackets, etc.
His wonderful pack kills the men, as the weight is so
disposed as to hang from, instead of resting on, the
shoulders. I was not introduced to Sir George, and
he took no notice of me the whole time I was on board
except one time to take wine with me, and to say,
‘Well, sir, I’m off now,’ the day he went on shore.
He offered me no facilities, and I did not ask for any,
and his staff, of course, are afraid of acting when they
see their chief so taciturn. I run a good chance of
starving if the army takes the field. ... I have no
tent, nor can I get one without an order, and even if I
had one I doubt very much whether Sir George Brown
would allow me to pitch it within the camp. All my
efforts to get a horse have been unsuccessful. I cannot
get out to the camp, for 17 miles a day with a letter .
to write would soon knock up Hercules. I am living
in a pig-stye, witlmut chair, table, stool, or window
glass, and an old nag of sixty to attend to me who ^
doesn’t understand a word 1 say. I live on eggs
and brown bread, sour Tenedos wine, and onions
and rice. The French have got the place to them-
selves.”

132

THE CRIMEAN WAR [Chap. XII.

Exactly a month later, writing again to Delane,
he was able to report no improvement at Gallipoli.

“ Unless you were here you never could understand
the wretchedness of this place and the helplessness to
which one is reduced by the sullenness of the Greeks
and the apathy of the Turks.”

In a letter to his wife at the same time, he wrote : —

"You would laugh yourself sick if you saw my
room, how much more if you beheld me with a sheep’s
liver on a stick going home from market, and then
trying to cook it. Only for Alexander, the senior
Staff Surgeon here, who is a great chum of mine,
I should have been starved several times. He divides
his rations with me. My room has mud walls ; all
the windows are broken, and I can see everything
that goes on through the chinks in the floor. The
Turkish officer has given me a field officer’s tent, but
it is too cold in the camp to go out there for another
month, and then I hope to be somewhere else. If we
were to take the field now, I should run every risk of
being starved.”

Russell had made good his right to criticise the
commissariat and medical services by the warning he
had offered in a letter sent from Malta weeks before a
sign of disorganisation had appeared or he had con-
ceived that such disorganisation as was already
apparent could be possible. He wrote then : —

“ With our men well clothed, well fed, well
housed (whether in camp or town does not much
matter), and well attended to, there is little to fear.
They are all in the best possible spirits, and fit to go
anywhere, and perhaps to do anything. But inaction
might bring listlessness and despondency, and in their
train follows disease. What is most to be feared in an
encampment is an enemy that musket and bayonet
cannot meet or repel. Of this the records of the
Russo-Turkish campaign of 1828-9, in which 80,000
men perished by ‘ plague, pestilence, and famine,’ afford

ON TO SCUTARI

133

1854]

a fearful lesson, and let those who have the interests
of the army at heart just turn to Moltke’s history of
that miserable invasion, and they will grudge no
expense, and spare no precaution to avoid, as far as
human skill can do it, a repetition of such horrors.
Let us have plenty of doctors. Let us have an over-
whelming army of medical men to combat disease.
Let us have a staff, full and strong, of young and
active and experienced men. Do not suffer our soldiers
to be killed by antiquated imbecility. Do not hand
them over to the mercies of ignorant etiquette and
effete seniority, but give the sick every chance which
skill, energy and abundance of the best specifics can
afford them. The heads of departments may rest
assured that the country will grudge no expense on
this point, nor any other connected with the interest
and efficiency of the corps d' elite which England has
sent from her shores.”

While the Light Division was still at Gallipoli, Delane
was promised at the Horse Guards that Russell should
be allowed to accompany the Army and to draw rations.
Russell’s name had even been mentioned to Lord
Raglan, but Russell says in a letter from Gallipoli : —

“ I did not see Lord Raglan or Lord de Ros when
they were here, as I had no idea my name had been
mentioned to them. Sir George Brown has been civil ;
asked me to dinner, etc., but has done nothing really
useful, and is too stiff-necked a veteran not to regard
my presence here as revolutionary and distasteful.
Not an order of the day, not an intimation of a review,
of an inspection, or of a movement of any kind have I
ever received from him or his staff, though I am on
good terms with the latter.”

From Gallipoli Russell, heartily glad to leave the
miserable, dirty little town, took steamer to Constan-
tinople, and thence crossed to Scutari, where the Guards
were encamped.

“There," he says, “I pitched my little tent permissu
superiorum on the left flank of the Coldstream. A

134

THE CRIMEAN WAR [Chap. XI L

servant whom I had engaged, Angelo Gennaro, ex-
brigadier of the Papal Dragoons, began to look
after me.”

At Scutari he could buy what he wanted and was
comfortable, but not for very long. One evening,
returning from a ride, he discovered his tent as flat as
a pancake about four hundred yards from camp, and
Angelo, Marius-like, sitting on it. “ Un officiale
brutale ” said the ex-brigadier, had ordered the tent to
be removed at once. On inquiry Russell found that the
Commander-in-Chief and his staff had been inspecting
the camp ; someone noticed the tent, a non-regulation
ridge-pole thing. “ Whose is it ? ” " The Times

correspondent’s.” Brigadier B'entinck at once ful-
minated : “ What the, etc., is he doing here ? ” And
the tent came down.

Now, it so happened that when Russell was at
Malta, the Brigadier had specially invited him to
accompany the Guards ; but many things had happened
since then. In his first letter from Gallipoli, Russell
had related how the sick were landed without blankets
or necessaries. A question was asked in the House
of Lords.

“ And the Duke of Newcastle,” writes Russell, “ was
put up as an official mortar to discharge a paper shell
(full of figures and of everything but facts) to blow me
to pieces, and to prove that every comfort was pro-
vided for the sick. It would have been well for his
own sake and that of the Army if that salutary warn-
ing had been taken by the Duke of Newcastle. I had
given praise to the French arrangements. That had
excited the anger of the Headquarters’ Staff, influenced
by the Gallophobia of Peninsular and Waterloo days
among their seniors, to whom I — possible father of all
‘ the curses which afflict modem armies ’ — ^was a
‘ Gorgon and Hydra and Chimsera dire.’ ”

1854] RUSSELL AN OUTCAST 135

After this Russell could get nothing in camp for
himself or for those he employed.

One day, in consequence of a letter from Printing
House Square which informed him that the Govern-
ment had ordered that “ facilities should be afforded ”
to him, he went to the quarters of Lord Raglan, a
pleasant house on the seashore near Scutari. Lord
Raglan was “very much engaged,” but Russell was
received by Colonel Steele, who listened to his request
for transport with an expression half of amazement
and half of amusement, and in the end informed him
most courteously that there was not the smallest
chance of his obtaining it.

Russell remarks on this that “ perhaps, after all, the
state of correspondents who were treated in this way
was the more gracious ; they were freer agents than
they have become since under military censorship
with tickets and badges.”

These words, of course, are not intended to deny
that the control and supervision of correspondents in
war is absolutely necessary. He bowed to his fate at
Scutari, crossed the water to Pera, and put up at
Missirie’s Hotel

“There were many double-bedded rooms in the
hotel,” he writes, “ and the custom of the house was
to charge a guest in one of these rooms for the board
of two persons, ie., 325. a day. Sir Colin Campbell at
the end of a week called for his bill ‘ What is this I
I am only one, and you charge me for two 1 ’ ‘ But
General,’ explained Missirie, ‘you have dupple bed-
room, and we must charge you for two.’ Next day
there was a prodigious tumult in the hotel at dinner.
A hideous mendic^t from the Galata Bridge made his
appearance with Sir Colin Campbell’s card, and resisted
the attempts of the waiters to remove him. ‘Yes,
certainly,’ smd Sir Colin Campbell, ‘ that gentleman is
coming to dine with me, and to sleep here, as I pay tor

136 THE CRIMEAN WAR [Chap. XII.

his board and bed.’ Missirie was beaten. The Greek
was no match for the Scotsman.”

After another week’s delay at Pera, Russell embarked
with an expeditionary flotilla to Varna. An extract
from a letter in which he described the Bosphorus
as he saw it from the deck of the Vesuvius is
given here as a specimen of his manner. Many
“ special correspondents ” have described the Bos-
phorus since then ; some of them with the rather
overwrought skill which the competition in distin-
guishing styles has imposed upon them ; but Russell’s
method will always remain an unexceptionable model
for the school. It is flowing, but not flowery; it is a
perfect stranger to affectation ; and it is, above all,
informing. In a newspaper affectation is one of the
vilest of faults, because it springs from a fundamental
misconception of what is appropriate. Sometimes
Russell’s feelings expressed themselves in torrential
passages which approach grandeur, and these have
the peculiar grace of sincerity, because it is obvious
that they were not more deliberately manipulated than
the sentences in which he records the change of a
camping ground or the arrival of new troops. The
description of the Bosphorus is not one of these
passages; it is chosen for its typical, its average,
qualities ; but surely no one who has looked upon that
wonderful water where West gazes across at East,
nnd where too late in life the Romans discovered the
finest seat of Empire in the world, will deny that
Russell absorbed and could convey the very spirit of
the place.

“No voyager or artist can do justice to the scenery
of the Bosphorus. It has much the character of a
Norwegian fiord. Perhaps the rounded outline of the

RUSSELL’S STYLE

1854]

137

hills, the light rich green of the vegetation, the
luxuriance of tree and flower and herbage, made it
resemble more closely the ' banks of Killarn^ or
Windermere. The waters escaping from the Black
Sea, in one part compressed by swelling hillocks to a
breadth of little more than a mile, at another expanding
into a sheet of more than four times that breadth, run
for thirteen miles in a blue flood, like the Rhone as it
issues from the Lake of Geneva, till they mingle with
the Sea of Mannora, passing in their course beautiful
groupings of wood and dale, ravine and hillside,
covered with the profusest carpeting of leaf and blade.
Kiosk and pleasure-ground, embrasured bastion and
loopholed curtain, gay garden, villa, mosque, and
mansion decorate the banks in unbroken lines from
the foot of the forts which command the entrance up
to the crowning glory of the scene, where the imperial
city of Constantine, rising in many-coloured terraces
from the verge of the Golden Horn, confuses the eye
with masses of foliage, red roofs, divers-hued walls,
and gableSj surmounted by a frieze of snow-white
minarets with golden sumrnits, and by the S3mimetrical
sweep of Sl Sophia. The hills strike abruptly upwards
to heights varying from 200 feet to 600 feet, and are
bounded at_ the foot by quays, which run along the
European side, almost without interruption, from Pera
to Bujukderd, about five miles from the Black Sea
These quays are also very numerous on the Asiatic
side.

“ The villages by the water-side are so close together
that Pera may be said to extend from Tophane to the
forts beyond Bujukder6. The residences of the pashas,
the imperial palaces of the Sultan, and the retreats of
opulence line these favoured shores; and as the
stranger passes on, in steamer or caique, he may catch
a view of some hoary pasha or ex-govemor sitting
cross-legged ip his garden or verandah, smoking away,
and each looking so like the other that they might all
pass for brothers. The windows of one portion of
these houses are mostly closely latticed and fastened,
but here and there a bright flash of a yellow or red
robe shows the harem is not untenanted. These
dwellings succeed each other the whole length of the

138 THE CRIMEAN WAR [Chap. XII.

Bosphorus, quite as numerously as the houses on the
road from Hyde Park Corner to Hammersmith ; and
at places such as Therapia and Bujukdere they are
dense enough to form large villages, provided with
hotels, shops, cafes, and lodging-houses. The Turks
delight in going up in their caiques to some of these
places, and sitting out on the platforms over the water,
while the chibouque or narghile confers on them a
zoophytic happiness, and the greatest object of Turkish
ambition is to enjoy the pleasures of a kiosk on the
Bosphorus. The waters abound in fish, and droves
of porpoises and dolphins disport in myriads on its
surface, plashing and playing about, as with easy roll
they cleave their way against its rapid flood, or gam-
bolling about in the plenitude of their strength and
security, till a sword-fish takes a dig at them, and
sets them off curvetting and snorting like sea-horses.
Hawks, kites, buzzards, and sea-eagles are numerous,
and large flocks of a kind of gregarious petrel of a
dusky hue, with whitish breasts, called by the French
ames damnees, which are believed never to rest, keep
flying up and down close to the water. Amidst such
scenery the expeditionary flotilla began its voyage at
eleven o’clock.”

CHAPTER XIII

AT VARNA

At Vama Russell came no nearer having his position
recognised. He wrote to Delane ; —

“ I have just been informed on good authority that
Lord Raglan has determined not to recognise the
Press in any way, or to give them rations or assistance,
and worse than all, it is too probable that he will
forbid our accompanying the troops. I have only
time to say so much to show you that the promises
made in London have not been carried out here. Part
of one Division, Brigadier Adams’, has got no tents.
There is no beef for the men for the last three days,
only mutton which the doctors say will bring on
dysentery. Just imagine this : the sappers and miners
sent out to Bajuk to survey do so in full dress, as
their undress clothes were not ready when they left.
Am I to tell these things or to hold my tongue ? ”

It is clear from Russell’s correspondence to the
Times that he did not wait for Delane’s answer.
Indeed, the question was probably meant to be rhetori-
cal; it required no answer. In any case Russell
would have accepted only one. “ Am I to tell these
things, or hold my tongue ? ” — it is one of those casual
exclamations which mark a crisis in a man’s life. For
a plain choice was now open to Russell: on the
one hand lay complaisance— a casuistical indulgence
towards errors which he might have told himself
are inseparable from all campaigns — and with it the
comparative comfort of being tolerated by the military
authorities ; on the other hand lay the ways of truth and
conscience and a painful enmity with powerful ofScers

140 AT VARNA [Chap. XIII.

who might be able to make his life a hell upon earth.
There is not a sign, or a shadow of a sign, that Russell
hesitated. He was within sight of the great occasion
of his career; and out of the problem the man of
resolution and honesty emerged. We have seen him
in flippant days speaking of himself as a mercenary
ready to take service with the side which paid him
the better; we have heard him acknowledge that
he had no urgent' political convictions except such as
had been given to him by his relations, together with
his clothes and education. But now the test which
comes sooner or later to every man, came to him. In
a few weeks he was to be a man of public affairs,
engaged no longer with descriptions of incidents
which were of no great importance one way or the
other, but concerned in the lives of thousands of
human beings, supplying the facts which shook the
Horse Guards and the Cabinet to their base, and
eventually brought the Aberdeen Ministry crashing
down to ruin. The office of the " special corre-
spondent ” was truly created at this time. Those who
hold the office to-day are legion; some stoop to
smallness and vulgarity, others rise to the performance
of services as useful in their different degrees to their
country and to human advancement as the services of
him whose life is here recorded.

One characteristic scrap may be taken from the
sketches of camp life which Russell wrote at Varna
The quotation is from “ The British Expedition to the
Crimea”*

“There was one phrase which served as the
universal exponent of peace, goodwill, praise, and

* The edition of 1858, published by Messrs, Routledge — a revised
form of the original letters, the present tenses having been converted
into past tenses.

Officer : “ Got any eggs, Johnny ? ”

Bulgarian : “ Yok, Johnny; yok, yok.’*’

(^cer ; ‘‘ Got any geese I ^^HBonogeeses, 'lohnny ? ”
Bulgarian : “ Yok, yok, yp^, yok ; no bono^ Johnny

On, Brave Horse 1 1

“ Our own Correspondent, on his gallant charger ‘ DarealL’

[To face p. 14 1,

“BONO JOHNNY!

1854]

141

satisfaction between the natives and the soldiery. Its
origin cannot be exactly determined, but it jprobably
arose from the habit of our men at Malta acldfessing
every native as ‘Johnny.’ At Gallipoli the soldiers
persisted in applying the same word to Turk and
Greek, and at length Turk and Greek began to apply it
to ourselves so that stately generals and pompous
colonels, as they stalked down the bazaar, heard
themselves addressed by the proprietors as ‘Johnny ’ ;
and to this appellation ‘ bono ’ was added, to_ signify
the excellence of the wares offered for public com-
petition. It became the established cry of the Army.
The natives walked through the camp calling out,
‘Bono Johnny I sood, sood ’ (milk)! ‘Bono Johnny!
Yoomoortler’ (eggs)! or ‘Bono Johnny! Kasler’
(geese) ! as the case might be ; and the dislike of the
contracting parties to the terms offered on either side
was expressed by the simple phrase of ‘No bono,
Johnny.’ As you rode along the road friendly natives
grinned at you, and thought, no matter what your
rank, that they had set themselves right with you and
paid a graceful compliment by a shout of ‘ Bono Johnny. ’

“Even the dignified reserve of the Royal Dukes
and Generals of Division had to undergo the ordeal of
this salutation from Pashas and other dignitaries. If
a benighted Turk, riding homewards, was encountered
by a picquet of the Light Division, he answered the
challenge of ‘ Who goes there ? ’ with a ‘ Bono Johnny,’
and was immediately invited to ‘ Advance, friend, and
all’s well ! ’ and the native servants sometimes used the
same phrase to disarm the anger of their masters. It was
really a most wonderful form of speech, and, judiciously
applied, it might, at that time, nave ‘ worked ’ a man
from one end of Turkey in Europe to the other.’’

At Varna there was still a general disbelief in the
possibility of war, in spite of the orders received by
Lord Raglan for an expedition to the Crimea. One
remembers Lord Scoutbush, again, in “Two Years
Ago’’:—

“ ‘ I should have liked a fortnight’s fishing so,’ ’’
said he in a dolorous voice, “ ‘ before going to be eaten

AT VARNA

142

[Chap. XIII.

up with fleas at Varna— for this Crimean expedition
is all moonshine.’ ”

At Varna, and in the camp near it, Russell met with
all his old difficulties; he was a “camp-follower”
without even an ordinary camp-follower’s sanctions,
and he was treated accordingly. In June he wrote to
Delane from a spot outside the camp of the Light
Division at Aladyn : —

“ I found that my tent had been removed and put
outside the lines of the camp, and when I went up to
Colonel Lawrence he informed me in the kindest and
gentlest manner possible, that he had been told when
at Scutari not to remove my tent then (it was inside
the lines) but that if I pitched it inside the lines
subsequently, to have it removed. The only ‘dis-
agreement ’ of this is that I am liable to robbery when
away, and have no protection except what I can afford
myself Moreover, it has also the effect of putting me
outside the army — making the officers fight shy and
the men think me an outcast”

The letter goes on to recount a meeting with Sir
George Brown ; —

“ I happened to be speaking to one of his aide-de-
camps the other day outside his house when he came
out and said, ‘Oh, here you are, Mr. Russell! Are
you come to take my portrait ? ’ ‘ I am not an artist.
Sir George,’ said I, ‘ and your face is too well known
to need_ my pencil if I were.’ ‘ You never came to
see me in Scutari, though you found out I had boils
on my face.’ ‘ I beg your pardon,’ said I, ‘ I called
twice and you were out on both occasions.’ ‘Oh,
did you ? Well, whenever you come I shall be glad
to see you,’ and off he rode, never having looked
at me the whole time. After a time he shouted,
‘You saw your Gallipoli letters and the Russian
speech in Parliament were the only English extracts
quoted in Russian newspapers?’ and went off

^mbling. He said the other day, ‘ Those d d

Colonels don’t curse enough. They’ll never be any

THE SOLITARY TENT

143

1854]

good till they curse. The Brigadiers must curse
them, and they must curse their captains.’ Altogether
he is a strange man. Because he never had fever in
Spain he thinks no one should have it here. He
says a white cap is as hot as a black one. As he
was thrown into a cart on some straw when shot
through the legs in Spain, he thinks the same
conveyance admirable now, and hates ambulances as
the inventions of the evil one. He is a splendid old
fellow as a soldier ; he spares himself least of all, and
he spares none in his zeal for the Service.”

When the Duke of Cambridge came to Aladyn,
some weeks later, with the Guards, he saw a solitary
little blue-striped tent on the camping ground which
had just been deserted by the Light Division. The
Duke sent an officer to inquire whose tent it was.
He was told, “ It belongs to Mr. Russell, of the Times”
The Duke was vastly astonished and perplexed —
“What is he doing there?” The tent was left,
however, in proud isolation unassailed, till Russell’s
bullock transport arrived from Varna in the evening
and took him and his belongings to Devna. It turned
out to be a poor escape for the troops from the
unwholesomeness and the pests of Varna to the
radiant but poisonous meadows of Aladyn and Devna.

During all this time the anxiety of Mrs. Russell for
her husband had deepened daily as the talk of war
had become more precise. Her letters, no doubt, were
such as thousands of affectionate wives have written to
husbands in peril, yet the familiarity of the anxiety
does not, after all, reduce its poignancy to a single
soul. An illustration of the pathetic anxiety with
which she followed her husband’s progress may be
seen in her request that he should say what he was
doing at particular moments when she had been
writing to him, or particularly thinking of him.

144

AT VARNA

[Chap. XIII.

“ You ask me,” he says, in a letter written early in
June, when he was staying in Constantinople for two
or three days, “ to tell you what I was doing at half-
past six o’clock on Sunday night when your letter was
written. But, dear old Dot, you never imagined that
your letter would come so long after it was written.”

He nevertheless turned to his diary and transcribed
what he found under the required date. Here is the
unsatisfying and unromantic entry : —

“Dodged about the town. Met all kinds of queer
people, and finally Alexander and Ince. They dined
with me at Paola’s. After they left I went to Missirie’s.
No news. Chenery* sick. There is but little hope of
my getting assistance from Lord Raglan.”

In the camps at Aladyn and Devna Russell watched,
appalled, the spread of the cholera which visited first
the French expedition to the Danube, smiting down
thousands with its invisible hand. The angel of death
was at work, and “ the beating of his wings ” could be
heard everywhere. Before the Army moved to the
Crimea in September, 1854, Russell had to record that
there were more than six hundred sick in the Brigade
of Guards alone. When the Guards moved camp they
were not allowed to march more than five miles a day,
and their packs were carried for them. Russell lost
many good friends thus early in the campaign. Yet
war, as every soldier knows, has its own standard of
emotion ; men behold death with what might seem to
be callousness were it not known to be a providential
adjustment of the senses. In the camp there were
“sing-songs" such as there have been in every
modern camp, even the most stricken and exhausted.
Russell’s scrap books contain one topical song of these
days which referred to Sir George Brown’s passion

* Chenery was the Times correspond^t at Constantinople, of
whom more will be said later.

i8S4] “OLD BROWN” 14S

for having his officers cleaned-shaved and tight-
stocked. The song went to the popular tune of And
all to astonish the Browns/'

“ The fast English Ensign he went forth to fight
Against the t3n:annical Czar ;

So he sought for a dress not too hideous to sight,

And convenient to wear in the war.

He studied in what he could be most at ease,

When one of his friends about town,

Said, * Of course, my good fellow, you’ll dress as you please,
But, by George ! you’ll astonish old Brown.'

“ He can’t bear the old regulations to brave,

And if you would spare him a shock,

Every hair on your face you will carefully shave
And appear in a tight-fitting stock.

You may think in hot weather with this to dispense,

But such thoughts are received with a frown ;

If your dress were according to good common sense.

You would really astonish old Brown.

“ The fast English Ensign this good advice spumed ;

The comforts of life well he knew ;

Aware that in Turkey the sun and wind burned,

A beard and moustachios he grew.

A handkerchief loosely he tied his neck round.

His shirt collar nicely turned down ;

Round his forage cap next a white turban he bound.

And all to astonish old Brown.

But when he appeared in the sight of the Chief
Whose orders he ventured to brave,

The rage of Sir George quite exceeded belief,

As he roared out ‘ Go home, Sir, and shave I
A true English soldier in comfort be dressed ?

New fangled ideas I’ll put downl
In my younger days I knew no peace nor rest,

And my soldiers shan’t now I ’ cried old Brown.”

Early in August Russell received the following letter
from Delane: —

“Serjeants’ Inn,

"zoth, 1854.

“ Dear Russell, — I am very sony you should have
fancied yourself neglected, or been imder any anxiety

R. — VOL. I. L

146

AT VARNA

[Chap. XII L

as to the entire success of your letters. They could
not have been more complete ; they have been univer-
sally read and universally admired. Even the official
people have confined themselves to deprecating ‘ hasty
judgments,’ but the public has sided with you com-
pletely, and everything since written has corroborated
your Gallipoli letters so entirely that even the [word
illegible] are driven into sulky acquiescence, t have
remonstrated strongly against the petty vexations you
have been exposed to, and your private letters to me
have made the round of the Cabinet Your last is now
with the Duke of Newcastle, and he tells me that he
has written again by this post to Lord Raglan on your
behalf. I need not tell you that the Duke* is now
supreme, and I hope one consequence of his advance-
ment will be that the Army will be put in motion and
that some feat of arms worthy of the nation and the
Army will be performed. I hope and believe that a
blow will be struck against the Crimea, and am very
glad to observe that in your letter of the 8th you
advocate such a step. I fear that if you advance into
the plains of the Danube nothing but ‘Wardrop’s
Drops ’ will save you from fevers. We know happily
that you are all well provided, but the Army, without
resource, will lose more men from disease than would
take Sebastopol.

“ I am vexed to hear that you have not yet got your
saddle and other things which have lor^ been dis-
patched. I am coming out myself on the French boat
from Marseilles on August i6th, and will bring with me
whatever I can think of likely to be useful. I shall go
first, of course, to Mr. Chenery, but after a very few
days at Constantinople shall push on to the Army. If
there is time pray write me a few lines under cover to
Mr. Chenery; then I may bring on with me whatever
you want that can be got at Constantinople, and give
me also some advice as to my route.

“ There is nothing new here — a very dull but very
laborious Session of which everybody is heartily tired,
and an increasing impatience that something should
be done either by Fleet or Army which may reconcile

• The Secretaryship of State for War was created in June, 1854,
and the Duke of Newcastle was the first to hold the office.

SILISTRIA

147

i«S 4 j

us to double taxes and similiar inconveniences.
Troops are being sent off every day as fast as they
can be got ready, and before Michaelmas you will
probably have nearly 50,000 men in Turkey. If a
great blow is struck no one will complain, but we shall
soon have a strong outburst of murmurs if it should
turn out that nothing is to be done.

“ Believe me, with very kind regards and in
prospect of a speedy meeting.

“Yours ever faithfully,

“John T. Dei-ane.”

According to the arrangements made so far by
Delane for reporting the war, Chenery was to remain
at Constantinople, W. H. Stowe was to come to Varna
in order to leave Russell free to “ride to the sound
of the guns,” and Charles Nasmyth, a young officer
of the East India Company, was already gone to
Silistria. Delane’s original plans were, of course, laid
on the expectation that there would be a campaign
on the Danube. When the attitude of Austria com-
pelled Russia to leave the Principalities, everything
was changed, and the movements of the various corre-
spondents had to be adapted frequently and quickly to
the circumstances. Russell was bound to take some
responsibility upon himself in meeting emergencies
when there was no time to communicate with Delane.
For example, during the fighting at Silistria, he wrote
home that he had virtually decided to go there tem-
porarily in order to join the Turkish Army, although
there were two correspondents acting for the Times
with it already. As the fighting at Silistria was the
only important event at the moment when Russell
took his decision, there seems to have been at least a
plausible case for concentrating the forces of the Times
in that direction. Circumstances, however, changed
this plan. A letter written by Mowbray Morris, the

148

AT VARNA

[Chap. XIII.

manager of the Times, on August 8th, 1854, shows
that such a decision as Russell’s, obviously taken
out of zeal though it was, may expose the unhappy
war correspondent to a rather chilling disfavour.

“ I don’t think you adopted a prudent resolution,”
Mowbray Morris wrote. "A third correspondent
could hardly have been necessary ; and considering
the superior attractions to the British public of the
doings, however insignificant, of its own soldiers, I
doubt if you ought to leave them under any circum-
stances. As the matter now stands, we take it for
granted you are in the Crimea with the allied forces,
and we look anxiously for a letter from you describing
their embarcations and disembarcations and sub-
sequent proceedings. Your letters attract a good deal
of attention, and all your statements are fully corro-
borated by the letters of officers to their friends at
home.”

The letter incidentally illustrates the slowness and
inadequacy of communication in those days; at the
beginning of August Mowbray Morris is under the
impression that the Allied Armies are already in
the Crimea 1 The British fleet of transports did not
sail from Varna till the first week in September.

A few words should be said here of the distinction
of the correspondents employed by the Times. Thomas
Chenery was a singularly accomplished Arabic and
Hebrew scholar, and he became Professor of Arabic at
Oxford.* When ultimately he succeeded Delane as
editor of the Times, he could not match Delane’s genius
for maintaining a constant rapport between editorial
opinion and public opinion, for discerning political
signs, and for screwing up to its highest legitimate
point the whole “business of publicity.” In other
words, he was not an efficient successor to Delane ;

* The “ Dictionary o£ National Biography/^

i8s4] DISTINGUISHED CORRESPONDENTS 149

but only an exceptional man could have been. As an
Orientalist he had few rivals; he is said to have
spoken like a native those languages which he
professed to know.

Charles Nasmyth reached Silistria as Times corre-
spondent before it was invested by the Russians.* He
and another young Englishman, Captain J. H. Butler,
won the confidence of the Turks, and became the
organisers of the defence. So successful was
Nasmyth’s leadership that the Russians were com-
pelled to raise the siege on June 22nd, 1854, and he
well earned his title of “ Defender of Silistria.” His
opposition to the forces of the Czar probably saved
the Allies a Danubian campaign. Nasm3^h was thanked
by the British and Turkish Governments, and was
given a commission in the British Army. Kinglake,
who met him in the Crimea, described him as “ a man of
quiet and gentle manners, and so free from vanity — so
free from all idea of self-gratulation — that it seemed as
though he were unconscious of having stood as he did
in the path of the Czar, and had really omitted to think
of the share he had had in changing the face of events.”

William Henry Stowe was the intimate friend at
Oxford of Bradley, afterwards Dean of Westminster,
and of Conington, and was placed first in the first
class of the final classical school with Stubbs and
Edward Parry.* After winning an open fellowship at
Oriel, he became a regular contributor to the Times
on literary subjects. While acting as Times corre-
spondent and as almoner of the Times fund for the
relief of the soldiers, he died at Balaclava in June,
1855, as will be recorded later. A cenotaph to his
memory is in the chapel at Oriel.

* The “ Dictionaiy of Natiocal Biography/’

150

AT VARNA

[Chap. XIII.

One cannot contemplate the names of Chenery and
Stowe without reflecting on the curious turn of
fortune— inevitable in the circumstances, yet deeply
ironical — which exposed men of their intellectual
dignity to the capricious treatment of camp-followers.
As camp-followers they had to make up their minds
to submit themselves, if necessary, to the most
arbitrary treatment by the most irrational subaltern.

When the order was given at Varna to embark for
the Crimea, Russell was. amused by the contrast
between the Ordre General of St. Arnaud and the
memorandum of Lord Raglan. The French order
ran: —

“Soldats, — Vous venez de donner de beaux spec-
tacles de perseverance, de calme, et d’dnergie, au
milieu de circonstances douleureuses qu’il faut oublier.
L’heure est venue de combattre, et de vaincre.

“L’ennemi ne nous a pas attendu sur le Danube.
Ses colonnes demoralis^es, ddtruites par la maladie,
s’en eloignent peniblement. C’est la Providence,
peut-6tre, qui a voulu nous 6pargner I’epreuve de ces
contrees malsaines. C’est elle, aussi, qui nous appell6
en Crimee, pays salubre comme le notre, et a
Sebastopol, si6ge de la puissance Russe, dans ces
murs oil nous aliens chercher ensemble le gage de la
paix et de notre r6tour dans nos foyers.

“ L’ente^rise est grande, et digne de vous vous la
realiserez k I’aide du plus formidable appareil militaire
et maritime qui se vit jamais. Les flottes adliees, avec
leur trois mille canons et leurs vingt-cinq mille brave
matelots, vos 6mules et vos compagnons d’armes,
porteront sur la terre de Crim6e une armee Anglaise,
dont vos pferes ont appris ci respecter la haute valeur,
une division choisie de ces soldats Ottomans qui
viennent de faire leurs preuves sous vos yeux, et une
arm€e Fran^aises que j’ai le droit et I’orgueil d’appeler
I’dhte de notre arm6e toute enti^re.

“ Je vois 1& plus que des gages de succ^s; J’y vois
le sucefes Iui-m6me. G6n6raux, Chefs de Corps,

GLORY OR DUTY?

1854]

151

Officiers de toutes armes, vous partagerez, et vous
ferez passer dans Fame de vos soldats la confiance
dont la mienne est remplie. BientOt, nous saluerons
ensemble les trois drapeaux reunis flottant sur les
ramparts de Sebastopol de nO'tre cri national, ‘Vive
I’Empereur ! ’

“ Au Quartier-general de Varna, Aout 25, 1854.

(Signee) “Le Marechal de France,

“ Comm.-en-Chef L’Armee d’Orient,

“A St. Arnaud.”

Lord Raglan in his memorandum requested “Mr.
Commissary-General Filder to take steps to insure
that the troops should all be provided with a ration of
porter for the next few days.” Russell was reminded
of “ the bathos of the Scottish colonel’s address to his
men before the Pyramids compared to Napoleon’s
high-flown appeal.” But may we not suppose that
Russell also had some secret liking and respect for the
imperturbability of his countrymen ? It was ever thus.
Napier, in his history of the Peninsular War, remarks
that Napoleon always spoke to his men of “glory,”
but Wellington simply of “ duty.”

CHAPTER XIV

AT THE BATTLE OF THE ALMA

Russell was given a berth in the City of London by
Sir De Lacy Evans, commanding the Second Division,
who afterwards became his very firm friend. He was
wonderfully impressed by the spectacle of the six
hundred transports protected by the fleet, and he wrote
with admiration of the security with which the Army
was convoyed to the Crimea Yet he travelled in
conditions miserable enough. He arrived in the
Crimea without baggage, man, or horse, and was thus '
set down desolate upon the beach at Old Fort.

“ When after some days and nights on the beach,"
he writes, “ I set out on September 19th, on my
eventful campaign, I had only one wretched Tartar
horse, borrowed clothes, and a small bag with a
change of linen, etc, pour tout potage ; I was completely
unattached, with no base of operations but myself,
and the vaguest possible idea of what I was going
to do.”

But to return to the landing. In a letter to the
Ttfnes he told how each soldier came creeping down
the ship’s ladder while “Jack helped him tenderly from
rung to rung,” took his firelock and stowed it away,
packed his knapsack under the seat, patted him on the
back and told him not to be “ afieerd on the water."
The sailor treated the “ sojer,” in fact, in a very kind
and gentle way as though he were a large but not
very sagacious pet who was not to be frightened or
lost sight of on any account

After wandering about for a long time in the

Landing of our own Times Correspondent and destruction of the
other Correspondents.

(A sketch by Captain Swaeby )

1854] THE LANDING ON THE BEACH 153

confused scene on the beach, “curious, exciting, but
not exhilarating,” Russell tried to return to the
City of London, for the night The wind had risen,
the surf was breaking heavily, the night fell suddenly,
and, with his first experience of that Cimmerian dark-
ness with which he was to become familiar, dovra
came thick, pitiless rain.

“ The watch-fires threw out more smoke than heat,
the firewood hissed spitefully in its fight for life, the
men lay huddled together on the beach in their great-
coats like glistening furrows fresh turned by the
plough.’’

Russell asked an officer where the Rifle Brigade
was. “Gone to Jericho, I think,” was the answer.
“ This is the 33rd, the Duke of Wellington’s lot, arid
a very pleasant set of fellows we are, as you may
see.” “Sennacherib’s host were just as lively after
the departure of their visitor,” comments Russell.
Abandoning all hope of returning to the ship, or of
finding his friends in the Rifle Brigade, Russell crept
under a cart and spent the night listening to the splash
of the rain, the thunder of the surf, and the striking of
the ship’s bells. He slept but intermittently, and
when he finally awoke before the dawn he saw in the
direction of Sebastopol a red glow in the sky where
the Cossacks were burning on the Steppe houses that
might afford any shelter to the enemy.

That day he became the lucky possessor of a horse,
“a fiddle-headed, ewe-necked beast with great bone
and not much else,” for which he paid £20. He rode
out some six miles to the front, saw his friend Norcott,
of the Rifle Brigade, who was occupying a village,
and watched the Cossacks still burning houses. On
September 19th, the Allied Armies left their bivouac

154 THE BATTLE OF THE ALMA [Chap. XIV.

on the beach, and moved in the direction of Sebas-
topol.

Russell thought at once that the Turks were mis-
used by St Amaud, under whose command General
Suleiman Pasha was placed.

"The soldiers who defended Silistria, Eupatoria,
and Kars,” he wrote afterwards, “were not, forsooth,
fit food for cannon ; they were beasts of burthen,
hewers of wood and drawers of water, carriers of
shot and shell — pack animals, starved, abused and
neglected.”

This is a characteristic outburst of generous indig-
nation, but we have to recognise that nearly all armies
which are drilled with great precision are intolerant
of more irregular allies who have as little military
science as the Turks had then. OfiScers can hardly
be induced to admit that such troops may be profitably
employed. In the Spanish-American War of 1898
the American officers were shocked to discover that
the Cubans, in whose cause they were fighting, knew
terribly little of drill or tactics. They did not
concern themselves with the question whether men
who did happen to know their own country like the
palms of their hands, and who had an exquisite degree
of bushcraft, could be used in services which are
necessarily not provided for in the manuals of great
armies.

During the march to the Alma, Russell felt that his
inspection of the Army might be interrupted at any
moment He was equipped in a manner that was
suitable neither for the invasion of the Crimea nor for
proclaiming the reason of his presence. He wore a
Commissariat officer’s cap with a broad gold band, a
rifleman's patrol jacket, cord breeches, butcher boots.

I8S4] GENERAL PENNEFATHER

155

and huge spurs. The boxes containing a more
carefully thought-out kit sent from London were
somewhere on the sea.

The day before the Battle of the Alma he was riding
near Pennefather’s Brigade when an oflScer came out
from a group and said, “ General Pennefather wants to
know who you are, sir, and what you are doing here ? ”
Russell explained, but the aide-de-camp said, “ I think
you had better come and see the General yourself”

Russell did so. “ By , sir,” exclaimed the General,

when Russell had told him all he could about himself,
“ I had as soon see the devil ! What do you know
about this kind of work, and what will you do when
we get into action ? ” “ Well, sir,” answered Russell,

“ it is quite true I have very little acquaintance with
the business, but I suspect there are a great many here
with no greater knowledge than myself” Pennefather
laughed, “ Begad, you’re right. You’re an Irishman,
I’ll be bound, and what’s your name, sir ? ” Russell
told him. “Are you from Limerick ? ” “ No, sir ; but
my family are.” “ Well, good-bye ; go to the rear, I
tell you now. There will be wigs on the green to-day,
my boy, so keep away from the front if you don’t want
to have your nose cut short” Years afterwards
Russell reminded Pennefather of their first interview.
“ Do you know,” said Pennefather, “ I often thought
afterwards what a comfort it would have been to the
Government if I had put you in charge of the provost,
and sent you on board ship. Mind, I’m glad I didn’t
do it, anyway.”

As the Army moved on it suddenly struck Russell
as quite a new idea that he had to go with it wherever
it went How and where in the event of a battle was
he to take up a position ? The thought troubled him.

156 THE BATTLE OF THE ALMA [Chap. XIV.

but he could come to no conclusion ; and even those
supports on which he had relied in his difficulties
seemed to be falling away. Sir De Lacy Evans,
thanks to whom he was in the Crimea at all, rode up
and asked, “What arrangements have you made to
accompany the Army ? ” “ None, sir.” The stern face
of the old soldier became sterner. “ You do not know
what you are about. Nor do those who sent you
understand what they are doing. Do get attached to
something or other. You must go to the Commissary-
General, to the Chaplain-in-Chief— to anyone you
know. Get attached to something. Go at once.”
Russell understood from those words that Evans
could do nothing more to help him.

On September 20th, the Battle of the Alma was
fought Russell tacked himself on to the large
cavalcade which followed Lord Raglan — Kinglake
was among them — but presently an officer, a country-
man of Russell’s, who was A.D.C. to Sir John
Burgoyne, came up. “You mustn’t stay here, I tell
you. There are orders for everyone to get out of
this.” Russell entreated him in vain. “ I’ll send Sir
John to you, I will, if you don’t go.”

" I never,” says Russell, “ was in a more unpleasant
position. Everyone else on the field bad some raison
(tetre. I had none. They were on recognised business.
It could scarcely be a recognised or legitimate business
for any man to ride in front of the Army in order that
he might be able to write an account of a battle for a
newspaper. I was a very fly in amber.”

During a halt about eleven o’clock Russell came
across an officer of his acquaintance who was reading
a letter from “my dear old wife.” Said he, “Well,
thank God, she’ll have something more than her
widow’s pension if I am knocked on the head to-day.”

1854 ] HOW TO SEE A BATTLE

157

“ No pension for my widow if I fall,” thought Russell,
“and for myself the motto, ‘Served him right’ Very
true, but very late to occur to me I ”

At half-past one the battle began. Russell made his
way to Sir De Lacy Evans, who informed him that he
was likely to see a great battle if he wanted to — a
piece of information that was scarcely necessary, as the
shells were bursting and the round shot were -thump-
ing the ground where the British were awaiting the
order to advance. Soon Russell came in sight of Sir
George Brown, who addressed him by name, and was
good enough to remark, “ It’s a very fine day.” “And
then,” adds Russell, “ he waved his hand as if to brush
me away.”

The Battle of the Alma belongs to history, and it
would be quite superfluous and improper to describe
it here ; we are concerned with the fighting only as it
affected Russell himself.

Russell did not cease to be troubled by the ques-
tion, which will always perplex correspondents,
whether he was standing in the best place to see
the battle. It is a question which becomes increas-
ingly difficult as the range of fire increases. To-day
no man who applies himself to get what people call a
“ realistic ” impression of fighting can hope to have an
accurate or even a coherent idea of the tactical hand-
ling of troops along a wide front In modem warfare
the employment of many correspondents is necessary
to enable a newspaper to produce a connected account
of a single battle. The only correspondent who can
acquaint himself with the general issue is he who
stays in the rear, where the field telegraph and tele-
phone wires converge upon headquarters. Although
it was more nearly possible for Russell to follow

158 THE BATTLE OF THE ALMA [Chap. XIV.

simultaneously both the particular and the general
issue than it is to-day, his immediate vision was often
obscured by the smoke. What he did see he saw at a
comparatively short distance. Our Army in South
Africa, when fighting against an .invisible enemy,
would indeed have been diverted and relieved by some
such incident as Russell described on November 30th,
1854:—

“The Grand Duke Michael and a very large staff
were seen making a reconnaissance in front of the
British lines. Persons on the British side said that
they could see Prince Menchikoff with the party. The
Grand Duke was recognisable by the profound respect
paid to him, hats being taken off wherever he went,
and by the presence of a white dog which always
accompanied him. While he made his inspection his
telescope was propped upon muskets and bayonets,
and he referred to a very large chart on a portable
table.”

No one who has attempted in recent times to
describe a battle with no evidence to go upon except
that which has fallen under his own eyes can have
been a stranger to the despair which overtakes hirii
when he reflects that he has undertaken to supply his
readers with a coherent narrative. Of all the
impossible things in the world that seems the most
impossible. He would pay a large sum for the last
edition of a Lcaidon evening newspaper. Every
Londoner with a halfpenny to spare knows more than
he does; for the paper at all events contains some
official infonnation from the General in the field, who,
having command of all the wires, is bound to be the
best war correspondent Yet even the General him-
self does not learn many of the smaller incidents of
the day till months afterwards, and some of them may
remain in doubt for years. It is not perhaps till

THE FOG OF WAR

1854]

IS9

generations have passed that the description of a
battle becomes stereotyped, and schoolboys who draw
plans of it can be solemnly rapped on the knuckles for
putting the cavalry or the guns a few yards out of
position.

Kinglake’s glowing history of the Crimean War
is accepted as the first authority, yet Russell tells
us that there were conflicting statements as to what
took place in the attack on the great twelve-gun
battery at the Alma, even before the smoke had
cleared away. Sir George Brown and Codrington
each had his story, and Kinglake followed Codring-
ton’s. Very likely it was the true version ; certainly
Codrington would rather have died on the spot than
say anything he did not believe to be true. But at
least there was another story which was not accepted,
but which had a degree of credibility.

“Nothing,” says Russell, “irritated Sir George
Brown more than Kinglake’s criticisms of the Light
Division. He was especially angry at the remarks on
his shortsightedness. ' The man is as blind as a bat
himself! Though I am not very long-sighted, I can
shoot tolerably well and stalk a stag without spectacles !
He describes me as dashing on with plumes in my
cocked hat and appalling the Russians by my sanctified
appearance! In fact, I left my plume behind me in
Varna, and I never wore one while I was in the
Crimea! As for the Russians, they showed their
respect and consideration for me by hitting my horse
in five places.’ ”

In a footnote to his accoimt of the Battle of the
Alma in “The British Expedition to the Crimea,”
Russell writes : —

“As an instance of the difficulty of obtaining
information respecting the incidents of a general
action, I may state that Captain Henry, an officer

i6o THE BATTLE OF THE ALMA [Chap. XIV.

promoted from the ranks for his distinguished bravery,
told me that the guns were taken over a bridge and not
over a ford — that he was with the first gun, that no
wheeler was killed, and that he fired only on Russian
infantry, and never directed a round against the
Russian guns. In most of these statements it is
probable the gallant officer was mistaken, although
actually present”

As a final example, let us take an incident later in the
war. Russell writes in his account of the attack on
the Redan in “The British Expedition to the Crimea”: —

“ The difficulty of obtaining accurate information of
the progress of the action cannot be better exemplified
than by this fact, that at three o’clock one of our
Generals of Division did not know whether we had
taken the Redan or not” The British attack ceased at
1.48 p.m.

Such were the difficulties which assailed Russell
with an overwhelming sense of their magnitude during
and after the Battle of the Alma,

“ How was I to describe what I had not seen ?
Where learn the facts for which they were waiting
at home ? My eyes swam as I tried to make notes of
what I heard. I was worn out with excitement,
fatigue, and want of food. I had been more than ten
hours in the saddle; my wretched horse, bleeding
badly from a cut in the leg, was unable to carry me.
My head throbbed, my heart beat as though it would
burst I suppose I was imnerved by want of food and
rest, but I was so much overcome by what I saw that
I could not remain where the fight had been closest
and deadliest I longed to get away from it — from the
exultation of others in which thought for the dead was
forgotten or maexpressed. It was now that the weight
of the task I had accepted fell on my soul like lead.”

He did not attempt to write his account of the battle
that night He slept fitfully and feverishly, lying on
the ground under a commissariat tent, and awoke in
the morning with a maddening headache. The tent

I8S4] DESCRIBING THE ALMA i6r

was filled with noisy fellows, the heat was suffocating,
and the smell outside and inside was sickening.

In the early light he saw the soldiers carrying off
wounded Russians, digging graves, picking up the
dead and collecting arms. “ Heavens I ” he exclaimed
to a surgeon who was superintending the removal of
the woimded, “what a frightful amoxmt of suffering
there is around us ! ” The surgeon, a Scotsman and
a dialectician, prepared for argument at once : “ That's
a verra extraordinary observation, do you know, my
young friend ? D’ye think that one body’s pain can
be multiplied by another body’s pain ? Na, na! There’s
jist a number of wounded men and each has his own
pain — but it’s not cumuleetive at all” Russell was too
feeble to controvert the proposition.

He sat down on the parapet of a battery and began
to write. An officer of engineers, seeing his discomfort,
had a plank laid on two casks to make a writing-table,
and a Russian accoimt-book yielded a supply of
yellowish paper. The first letter he wrote never
reached London, and he congratulated himself after-
wards that it did not

After finishing his first imperfect letter he rode
about the field on a borrowed horse, and having
collected much new information, sat down to write
a new account of the battle.

“A few Irundred yards away,” he says in 'The
Great War with Russia,’ “the General was beginning
to write his despatch. Every line he wrote was
charged with fate and fortune. I was only scribbling.”

Kingsley’s “Two Years Ago” conveys in a few
words the effect of that despatch from Lord Raglan : —

“ He passed one of the theatre doors ; there was a
group outside, more noisy and more earnest than

R. — voi.. I. u

i62 the battle of THE ALMA [Chap. XIV.

such groups are wont to be ; and ere he could pass
through them, a shout from within rattled the doors
with its mighty pulse, and seemed to shake the very
walls. Another; and another! What was it?
Fire ! No. It was the news of Alma.”

Russell goes on : —

“ I did not then grasp the fact that I had it in my
power to give a halo of glory to some imknown
warrior by putting his name in type. Indeed, for
many a month I never understood that particular
attribute of my unfortunate position, and I may say
now in all sincerity and truth, I never knowingly
made use of it.”

It may be remarked here that if Russell had not
yet perceived the great and responsible power which
is in the hands of a correspondent in the field, the
officers of the Army on their side had not perceived
it either. This may be proved from many of the
artless requests for a mention of this or that which
Russell received from honest fellows. To-day, when
the relations between the correspondent and the
Army are better understood, the best t 3 q)e of officer
would shrink from demanding a special description
of some episode in which he was concerned, for that,
as one knows, would generally end in glorification of
himself. “ Advertising ” was not then cultivated, nor
had the art been developed of doing one’s fighting
under the eyes of a special correspondent.

“What will they say in England ? That question,”
writes Russell, “never occurred to me in my distracted
career till_ I had to deal with the misery that fell
upon us in the winter, and then indeed I thought,
as 1 wrote, that they in England would say that
their army shoffid not utterly perish. Better had I
discoursed upon the weather and said everything was
for the best: though more men might have died, I

i 8 s 4 ] writing under DIFFICULTIES 163
should not have made so many powerful and relentless

On October 3rd, 1854, he wrote to Delane :

tJ’e Alma when I
° thinking to write my account

i!° myself, had lost his

luggage and had no place to offer me. All I could
do was to get some paper and lie on the grass in the
hot sun and wnte such an account as I could of the

Wo t'r, J- ^ had to be put

mto an araba, in which I performed my journey^to

hialaclava. I am now recovering, but am very w /ah- ”

On October 17th, the day on which the bombard-
ment of Sebastopol began, Russell wrote to his wife

“I read your letter in the midst of the most
tremendous tumult and battle that ever the ear 5
man has heard perhaps. I have no time to reply to it
now, but can only say this, my dearest Mary that I

comfortable till my retuL
and that you must have whatever money is requisite
for your respectable appearance, and a^ much^ of k
as can be spared out of Mr. Willans’* clutches for
Sn, closing with sleep, and

and Ji it so dead beat— up at 4.30 this morning

Adtt Genl + nf of the

f ?f the 4th Division, as I am too tired to

nde back in the dark to Headquarters ; for you must

£‘e° mvS irr “d’at miht tS

are ravines _ to be crossed, to get from one nart tn

another, which makes it nasty work to ride/'

Mdd dfte, the iatosts of the Em.ell faml^wteaiva eS!"S

CHAPTER XV
AT BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN

After the Battle of the Alma, Russell settled down
at Balaclava with the Army. His servant Angelo, the
ex-brigadier of Papal Dragoons, who had followed
him to the Crimea, had taken as an assistant his
kinsman, one Virgilio Sebastiani. Angelo himself
was a tall, straight, handsome fellow, who had a
most gallant bearing except when he was near a horse :
“then all the dragoon part of him vanished and he
became a shifty, trembling footman.” Virgilio said
that he too had been a soldier, but he handled scissors
and razor in a style which made Russell think he had
been a barber.

No one appeared to know how long the Army
would remain at Balaclava before another attack was
made on the Russians. Camp “shaves” passed
incessantly from tent to tent Sir John Burgoyne,
who was then the dominant spirit, said, “ It’s all
nonsense to wait; we must get up closer, run up
our batteries under their noses, give them a good
hammering and dash at the place. The more we
look at it the less we shall like it.” ■ One evening,
Russell and six or seven of his friends were sitting
on the ground in a tent, smoking and chanting the
popular story of “Three Sailors lived in Bristol
City,” and had just thundered out '“and Admiral
Nelson, K.C.B.,” when the flap of the tent was
opened and by the light of a candle stuck in a bottle
they beheld the rugged features of Sir John Burgoyne.

854] CHARGE OF LIGHT BRIGADE 165

I

What’s all this about? Put out the light at once
nd let me hear no more nonsense. Confounded
Lonsense, too — Admiral Nelson never was a K.C.B.”

At the battle of Balaclava, Russell looked down
ipon the charges of both the Heavy and Light
'avalry in the valley, and was on the field a few
linutes after each event. Talking to the surviving
lembers of the Light Brigade when they were still
lulling themselves together after the appalling shock,
e found that they had no distinct image in their minds
if anything that had happened; to them the details
f the encounter were even more obscure than the
im figures had seemed to Russell as he watched
hem from the hill, emerging from and disappearing
a the wreaths of smoke. Hours afterwards, when
le rode from tent to tent looking for officers whom
le knew, he noted that his friends all spoke in the
ame way of the losses of comrades and horses — “ all
ar nothing.” "They had not,” he says, “the least
iea of the immense kudos they had gained for ever.”

When he returned to his tent at headquarters he
Dund it full of officers discussing the battle. He was
onfused with the multiplicity of the information
;iven to him, and much of it fitted in very ill with
v^hat he had observed himself; he had been nearly
he whole day without food and his head ached; he
vas exhausted to the point of utter dejection, and he
sit that the time and place were even less favourable
or writing than when he had lain in the hot sun after
he Battle of the Alma. Yet vmte he must, for the
aail would be leaving in a few hours. His writing-
able was his knee, his seat a saddle, and his lamp
. commissariat candle in a bottle. Such an expe-
ience as this, repeated many times in his long career.

i66 BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN [Chap. XV.

made him appreciate afterwards the remark of the
Crown Prince of Prussia in the Franco-German
War; “You are the hardest worker among us, for
when our work is over and we can go to sleep, you
have to begin again and describe what has been
done 1 ” As he wrote, his well-meaning but exas-
perating advisers retired one by one with the final
injunction in most cases to “shut up and go to sleep,”
and soon all the sound that came to him was the
sonorous breathings of his friends in the straw. He
struggled on till the candle “ disappeared in the bottle
like a stage demon through a trap door.”

In the account he wrote that night he used a phrase
which ought to last as long as the Army. In
describing the manner in which a charge of the
Russian cavalry was met by the Highlanders he said
“ The ground flies beneath their horses’ feet ;
gathering speed at every stride, they dashed on
towards that thin red streak topped with a line of steel"
If the phrase, the “ thin red line,”* into which Russell
afterwards changed his words, was at any time in
danger of being forgotten, Mr. Rudyard Kipling has
ensured its survival.

On November 4th, the day before the Battle of
Inkerman, Russell had the first of his rare encounters
with Lord Cardigaa As he was riding down from
his tent at headquarters to Balaclava, he met Lord
Cardigan, in Hussar uniform, and a man in a flat-
brimmed top hat, frock coat, and overalls strapped
over patent leather boots. This was Mr. de Burgh,
known to the London world as “ The Squire.” The
two had just landed from the yacht whence Lord
Cardigan commanded the Light Cavalry Brigade.

* See Appendix.

1854 ]

COLONEL EBER

167

“ Well, Mr. William Russell ! What are they doing ?
What was the firing for last night? And this morning? ”
Russell confessed ignorance. “You hear. Squire? This
Mr. William Russell knows nothing of that firing.

I daresay no one does! Good morning.” They rode
on. Years afterwards Lord Cardigan told Russell
that he started in the charge of the Light Brigade with
the words : “ Here goes the last of the Brudenells ! ”

On the beach Russell met Colonel Eber, who had
just been appointed a correspondent of the Times. He
was a Hungarian who had been a patriot in ’48
At the close of the struggle for Hungarian independ-
ence, he went to Turkey and afterwards to England. -
He rapidly acqiiired the English language, and became
a favourite in English society. On the breaking out
of the Crimean War he returned to Turkey, and as
correspondent of the Times joined Omar Pasha’s army.
Omar conceived a great esteem for him, and induced
him to accept the position of Chief of the General
Staff in Thessaly. He accompanied Omar Pasha to
Eupatoria, and followed his fortunes to the end of the
war. Later he acted as Times correspondent in the
Italian War of Independence, and was at the battles
of Magenta and Solferino. At Garibaldi’s urgent
request, General Eber, as he then was, took the
command of a brigade and was engaged in the most
brilliant of the Sicilian engagements. Afterwards he
was elected a member of the Himgarian Diet, and
acted as the Times correspondent at Vienna and PestK
Russell wrote of him after his death long afterwards :

“ Few men possessed such a profound acquaintance
with the politics of the Balkan region. He had the
geography and topography of Eastern Europe at his
finger ends, and the facility with which, with his map

i68 BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN [Chap. XV.

before him, he could follow or anticipate the movements
of troops, was very remarkable.”

At the time of the Crimean War, Russell described
him as “ querulous and sarcastic, capable and despon-
dent, though brave as a lion.” He seemed to regard
the Turkish Army as “almost under his care and
charge.”

Russell, after meeting him on the beach, took him
to his tent at headquarters, and after a great deal of
smoking and talking, they went to sleep to the accom-
paniment of the drip of rain and the thud of firing
in the trenches. Russell was aroused by a lantern
flashing in his eyes. “ Get up ; we are attacked 1 ” He
jumped up, struggled with his boots, put all the
biscuit he could find and a lump of cheese, into one
holster, and a revolver and a flask of rum into the
other, and rode outside headquarters to listen. Lights
were moving everywhere ; there were candles in the
windows of Lord Raglan’s house, but there was no
light in the sky, and a mist of rain obscured every-
thing. Dawn began to break as Eber and he rode
together towards the windmill where the firing
sounded heaviest Here they parted, and as soon as
Russell passed over the ridge which lay between head-
quarters ^d the main engagement, he found himself in
a raging battle. The still, dark atmosphere, heavy
with smoke, was reddened with the flash of artillery
as black thunder-clouds are illuminated by lightning.
He was at once vmder a very heavy fire — much the
heaviest he had been under — and he began posing
himself with the perplexing questions : “ What am I
doing here ? What chance have I of returning alive ?
But if I go elsewhere shall I see more, or less, of the
fighting?”

THE HAPPY MEAN

169

1854J

The correspondent has to strike a mean between
being near enough to the heart of things to be able to
write as an eye-witness, and refusing such undue
bodily risks as would make the money which his
newspaper has expended on his mission a preposterous
speculation. Let us suppose that he has taken part in
so many campaigns that war has become his normal
state of existence, and the battlefield, as it were, his
office. It will be seen that he would cut a ridiculous
figure, if with the gusto of a first experience he
continued incessantly to defy a fate ever ready to
carry him off.

The smoke and vapour were so dense that Russell
could see better without his field glasses. As he was
deliberating what he should do, a French officer
galloped out of the fog, pulled up his horse, and
said, “Mon Generali Pouvez-vous me dire oil se
trouve le General Brown ? ” This was not the first
time that the commissariat cap with the gold band
which Russell wore, conferred on him in the eyes of
our French and Turkish Allies the rank of General.

Russell moved about from one point of the field to
another with such leisureliness as ministered to his
self-respect, and presently fell in with Mr. H. Layard.*
Layard was one of the best known of the “T. G.’s,”
or Travelling Gentlemen, of whom there were generally
a few in the Crimea during the war brought by yachts
or by special permission in other steamers They
mostly made daily excursions on land and returned to
their sea base in the evening. Delane had been out
for a short time as a T. G., and Kinglake may be

* Afterwards Sir Henry Layard, He was the excavate of the
ancient Nineveh, and the anther of the well-known book, “ Nineveh
and its Remains.” He became British Ambassador at Madrid and
at Constantinople.

170 BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN [Chap. XV.

included in the class if only to invest it with dignity
and reason. Layard was the writer of a description,
published in the Times, of the Battle of the Alma, as
seen from the main top of the Agamemnon, which
commanded much praise at the time. With Layard
Russell rode to a point where the city of Sebastopol,
the MalakofF, the Redan, and other important points
were visible. From here at one time he saw the
French pursuing some Russians, and declares that
they actually went into Sebastopol itself,

"Sir H. Layard,” he wrote in “The Great War
with Russia,” “ saw these things as well as I did. I have
often spoken with Sir Henry Layard about it since,
and he is as positive about it as I am. I saw the red
breeches, blue coats, and kepis, as plainly as if they
were close at hand.”

Russell used to say that most of his reminiscences
of the Battle of Inkerman were “ personal ” ; not con-
cerning himself, but his friends and some of the chief
figures in the campaign. Probably this was as much
as to say, what was the truth about Inkerman, that it
was a battle of separate and disjointed, encounters in
which the various British and French efforts con-
verged on a great conclusion as much by accident as
by design.

According to his observation there was no exulta-
tion such as has been ascribed to our soldiers on this
occasion by others ; bello gaudentes proelio ridentes.
Sir George Brown, wounded and stretched on a litter,
was carried past him looking so white that Russell
supposed him dead till he waved his miinjured arm as
Russell took offhis cap. In answer to the inquiry if he
was badly wounded, Sir George Brown said : " I don’t
know, nor care! Our men are overpowered; that’s

1854] SIR DE LACY EVANS 171

all! You’ll have a bad story to tell if you live to
tell it”

A little later Russell met Sir De Lacy Evans.
Russell had reason to think that Sir De Lacy Evans
felt hurt at the preference given to Sir George Brown
by Lord Raglan, and at the chilliness with which he
was received at headquarters. Evans was now leaning
his right hand on the pommel of his saddle ; he was
suffering from a severe sprain, and seemed exceed-
ingly ill “ I expected this,” he exclaimed ; “ I warned
them of it again and again !”* “ But,” said Russell, “ we
have won. The Russians are retreating.” “Yes, they
are; but suppose they come out on us with greater
force whilst we are suffering under this loss ? I tell
you, sir — but you are not to put this in your letter —
we cannot remain here, even if we could trust the
French or the Turks. I trust neither.”

Although Russell saw so many battlefields in his
life, he never forgot the scene at Inkerman. At the
Sandbag battery the bodies of English, Russians, and
French were lying in strata, so that he could easily
believe that it was true that the Russians had made a
ramp of their own dead and had mounted on it to the
attack The battery was taken and re-taken six or
seven times. When he returned, overwhelmed with
pity at what he had seen, he foimd Eber already in
the tent with dinner spread on a newspaper, “My
God 1 wasn’t it an awful day 1 ” exclaimed Russell
“Awful?” said Eber; “No, a most bewdiful day;
fine baddle as ever vos. No men ever fide bedder !
But oh! such a vickedness! De Generals, I dink,
should all be shot Ve shall be addacked to-morrow

* Sir De Lacy Evans had pointed out to Lord RagUin the un-
defended state of the flank of the Second Dinsion.

172 BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN [Chap. XV.

or de day afder, and be swept into de sea or made
prisoners.”

The next day Russell went out with working parties
which were burying the dead, and was nearly killed
by a shell fired from one of the Russian ships in the
harbour. This was not the only shell fired from the
ships that day, and the indignation in the British camp
was great, as the Russians had agreed to a temporary
truce in the morning. Russell records in his diary
that all the shells with their hissing fuses were plainly
visible in the air, and that he had plenty of time to
take shelter after the first, but a fragment of that first
one tore a piece out of his coat. Years afterwards
a Russian officer told him that he knew perfectly well
that, tmder the pretence of burying the dead, the
British engineers were choosing new sites for batteries
“ I know your engineer officers wear cocked hats, and
I myself saw your men carrying fascines.” Russell
informed him that the cocked hats were worn by staff
officers who were near him, and that what the officer
supposed to be fascines were the litters of brushwood
and stunted trees on which the dead were being
carried. Every self-respecting officer who has been
through a war between civilised combatants, as well
as every civilian observer who prefers truth to
sensation, will acknowledge that the mistakes and mis-
understandings which cause firing at white flags,
hospitals, and ambulances, are more numerous than
the cases of simple treachery. Yet no charge is more
common in war than that white flags and ambulance
trains have not been respected,*

*.The writer remembers an occarfon at Willow. Grange in the South
A&ican War when he overheard a sergeant and his men complain
that ^ Boers were firing at them tfom under a white flag It
certainly seemed true. There were the Boers occasionally visible

1854] ACCUSATIONS OF TREACHERY 173

Russell long believed that the Russians had delibe-
rately broken the truce the morning after Inkerman,
and the Russians no doubt believed that the British
had done the same. Here we have the explanation
arriving by accident years after the event.

Three days after Inkerman Russell wrote to Delane :

“ Headquarters (Sebastopolwards),

“November Zth, 1854.

“ My Dear Sir, — ^Your kind letter of October i8th,
which was delivered to me as I was going over the
field of the Battle of Inkerman, heartsick and de-
pressed, was very grateful to me indeed, and cheered
me by its cordial praise, which I fear I do not deserve.
... I am convinced from what I see that Lord Raglan
is utterly incompetent to lead an army through any
arduous task. He is a brave good soldier, I am sure,
and a polished gentleman, but he is no more fit than I
am to cope with any leader of strategic skill. Old
Burgoyne advised the march on Balaclava. At the
Alma, with the exception of ordering up two guns into
a good position, and of the example of personal
courage he (Lord Raglan) was of no use. ‘ The only
order I ever received from him,’ said an officer, ‘ from
the time I left Buljak till I arrived at the crest of the
Alma Ridge were ‘ March ’ and ‘ Halt’ Alma was a
bulldog rush at the throat One grave, I fear irre-
mediable error, was in not rushing into Sebastopol
the instant we arrived before it The nut, I fear, is too
hard for our jaws to crack this winter. . . .

“ For a long time I was close to Lord Raglan on the
5th. He was wrong in two palpable respects: he
exposed himself uselessly to fire, and he gave no

along a ridge across the valley, and on the face of that ridge Sew the
white Sag. On examining the Sag ” carefully, however, the writer
found that it was a dead grey horse, which seemed to tremble in the
mirage. On another occasion, near Heilbron, he informed an
artillerj^ of&cer that he was firing on a Dutch ambutoce train. In
the distance and bad light the train looked exactly like an ordinary
convoy, which the ofScer had taken it to be. As the officer looked
again through his glasses a puff of wind blew out the Red Cross flags,
and the writer can never forget the expression of profound concern
and regret which came over his face as he recc^roised his mistake.

174 BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN [Chap. XV.

directions whatever ; he was a mere cool and callous
spectator. But the most serious disadvantage under
which he labours is that he does not go among the
troops. He does not visit the camp, he does not cheer
them and speak to them, and his person is in conse-
quence almost unknown to them. ‘ Is that old gentleman
with one arm the General ? ’ asked a sergeant of the 23rd
of another the other day when his lordship was riding
through the lines. I may be wrong in all I say, and
the conclusions I arrive at, but I do so honestly and I
am sure of my facts.

“ I cannot tell you what a state of anxiety my wife is
in, and I fear from what I hear that her health may
suffer. I really believe it will be best after all to break
up my little establishment in Guernsey and take her
out to Constantinople, but the future is so uncertain.
I would gladly take your advice. I would say more
on the subject if I had time.

“Yours ever truN,

“W. HL Russell.”

On the same day Russell wrote to his wife

“ Balaclava,

“November 1854.

“ Your dear, kind, noble letter came to cheer me up
on the 6th, after witnessing a scene more terrible than
that of the Alma ; and what a comfort it was to me I
cannot explain to you, though I am pained to see your
needless anxiety and alarm evinced in every line of it.
I have been protected by God’s mercy from illness
and the perils of war hitherto, and I think it wall be a
comfort to you to know that I have at last resolved on
coming here* to stay in case of any emergency from
the enemy arising to force us to retreat

“ Oh, dear Mary, the kind good Mends I have lost,
the dear companions of many a ride and walk and
lonely hour ! I have seen them buried as they lay all
bloody on the hillside amid their ferocious enemies,
and I could not but exclaim in all bitterness of heart,
‘Cursed is he who delighteth in war.’

“ I have had a letter from Delane. He will do

* RusseU did not, however, leave headquarters to live regularlv at
BvfMdava till a week or two later.

175

1 854] FELLOW CORRESPONDENTS

whatever you require, but the only difficulty I foresee
in your coming out here is that you will not be much
nearer to me than you were before, so far as seeing me
is concerned. What a proof of your affection for me it
is to propose to leave the children I ”

On November 9th Russell wrote to Delane : —

“ I fear my last letter was a very unconnected one,
and you would not wonder at it if you knew the circum-
stances imder which it was written. . . . Sunday, you
know, was the day of the Battle of Inkerman. I gave
Eber a shake-down the night before, and we were
together nearly all day, and two very narrow escapes
we both had. Once a shell burst, and the fragments
turned up the ground around us and threw the dirt ail
over Eber. I was in front of him, and a piece about
the size of a tea-cup whistled over my head as I lay on
the ground (for we saw the fellow coming towards us),
rapped the earth within an inch of my hand, threw up
the mould over Eber, who was likewise awaiting the
explosion, and then went on its way rejoicing.”

After giving Delane some information about the
behaviour of certain correspondents, which did not do
credit either to their industry or their courage, Russell
continues : —

“ Now I don’t mention these things to puff myself
off, but the fact is I have been greatly irritated by

reading an extract from the , sent to me by a friend,

stating that I, ‘ Mr. , the Times correspondent, had

bolted from the light Division at Devna, frightened
by the cholera, and was not likely soon to return,’
when the fact, notorious to anyone, was that I left
Devna days before a single case of cholera occurred,
that I stayed in Varna during the height of the plague,
and that I returned to the Light Division while it was
still raging. This attack — ^so far beyond the bounds
of journalistic hostility — has annoyed me because I
know that good-natxired friends will rejoice at it. I

have written to the editor of the , to tel! him that

I will trormce his lying correspondent within an inch
of his life if I ever catch him, and I have written to the
man himself to warn him what he has to expect if he

176 BALACLAVA AND INKERMAN [Chap. XV

meets me I had so much to write and think abou
before, that I forgot to mention this in my previoui
letters to you. . . . And now comes for me a grave
matter indeed. I know that we must winter here if we
are not driven into the sea, and I know, too, that my wife
must come out to Constantinople. Her letter receivec
yesterday really unmanned me. When winter sets ir.

I could run down and spend a week or so at Constan-
tinople now and then, for from all I hear operations ol
war will be impossible. I have written to her by this
post to make the necessary arrangements for having
the three children she will have to leave behind her
taken care of. The youngest she will take with her,
and as it is winter now I am quite puzzled as to the
best route for her to take from Guernsey. I am more
puzzled as to how to instruct her, for I much doubt her
capacity to work through with herself and maid. If
you can suggest anything I shall be much obliged to
you indeed. It is a serious matter, and I tremble lest
anything should befall them. ... I have already sup-
plied Mr. Morris with the details of the route from
Varna to Bucharest and thence to Constantinople, and
so on by telegraph to England (in 70 hours), and I
really think wonders might be done if we could get a
communication between this (Balaclava) and Varna.
Tm certain a telegraph might be dispatched from the
Crimea and received in London in 100 hours at
farthest. I have written several times to Chenery on
the subject, and ere I left Varna I commimicated to
him what arrangements could be made there, but the
breakmg up of our establishment at Varna, and the
cessation of regular intercourse with it, has quite
knocked up my plans.

" P.S.— The prospect of wintering here is appalling.
The families at Balaclava say that once winter sets in
they shut their houses, light their stoves, and grin and
bear it The bears walk about the streets, or used to
do so in winters past True, it will be as bad for the
Russians as for ourselves — if not worse, as long as
they are out in the open. If Chenery does not take
mercy on me Til be in rags. My nether man is by no
means in a respectable condition. Ughl the cold in
the tents at nights!

CHAPTER XVI

THE AWFUL PLATEAU

Early in November Russell received a generous
letter from Mr. Walter, the chief proprietor of the
Times : —

“ London,

“ October loth, 1854.

" My Dear Sir, — The approach of autumn reminds
me that, among the other ‘stem realities’ of the
war, I shall have to regret the loss of your company
this year on the occasion of the annual meeting of
your colleagues at my house. I cannot, however,
forbear writing you a few lines to assure you how
heartily we shall all sympathise with you on that
occasion, and, while we lament your absence, shall
feel ourselves honoured by its cause. If the glory
of the British arms has shone with imdiminished
lustre during this memorable struggle, it may safely
be added that on no occasion have the arduous and
even dangerous duties of ‘Our own correspondent’
been performed with equal ability or success. To
you, my dear sir, is the credit due of having added
another laurel to the crown of the ‘Fourth Estate’
by the fidelity and zeal with which you have
‘ reported,’ even on the field of battle, and evidently
at considerable peril, the glorious achievements of
our troops; while you have certainly earned their
gratitude by making known their needless hardships.
Whatever privations you have yourself encountered
in the discharge of these duties, it must be some
consolation to you to reflect that your light is not
hid under a bushel, but that your graphic descrip-
tions of the grand and terrific scenes you have
witnessed are read by hundreds of thousands with
the most intense interest, and will probably be as
imperishable as the memory of the deeds which they
recount I must not content myself, however, with

K.— VOL. I.

N

178

THE AWFUL PLATEAU [Chap. XV]

this barren acknowledgment of your services, bu
will conclude by saying that I have desired Mi
Morris to invest the sum of five hundred pounds ii
trust for the benefit of your children. And wishing
you a safe and speedy termination of your labours
I remain, my dear sir,

“Yours very sincerely,

“J. Walter.”

The great gale of November 14th, such a gale a:
the people of the Crimea experience only once in ;
generation, laid most of the British camp flat on thi
ground and strewed the harbour coast with the wreck;
of transports. It was only the prelude to a dreadfu
winter. The south-west wind veered more to th(
west and became colder, sleet fell first, and ther
came a snowstorm “ which covered the desolate land-
scape with white till the tramp of men seamed it with
trails of black mud.” The army before Sebastopol
scarcely recognised the significance of those first
white flakes which heralded the icy rigours of the
■winter months and were the samples of the materia]
in which the exhausted and frozen bodies of so many
gallant fellows were to be shrouded. Mr. Thomas
Hardy in “ The Dynasts ” has imagined that Napoleon’s
army dragging its slow length along in the disastrous
Russian expedition interpreted the arrival of the snow
with a keener vision.

“ And so and thus it nears Smolensko’s walls,

And stayed its hvmger, starts ane-w its crawls
Till floats down one white morsel which appals.”

When the storm abated Russell moved do'wn to
Balaclava from headquarters and there established
himself in a very miserable house, from which, how-
ever, he was soon to be ejected. Yet he records
that among the accumulation of suffering and disease,

A CLASSICAL PUN

179

1854]

“ some salt of our youth was left.” Shaves were as
familiar as usual and not less exciting; jokes were
not unknown, and one ventures to suppose that they
even took on new values. All his life Russell was
fond of recalling an excellent pun which was made
in the ghastly circumstances of that winter. One
particularly miserable day an aide-de-camp came
down from headquarters to Balaclava charged with
the double mission of receiving some stoves for Lord
Raglan’s house and of escorting a baronet and his
daughter — a. lady of great fortune and personal
attractions — who were visiting the Crimea to see
a relation in a cavalry regiment. The shivering
aide-de-camp was complaining of his errand to the
cosy officer who was acting as Captain of the BeacL
“ You fellows have a fine time of it down here I Look
at me! I am sent down this charming morning to

land his lordship’s stoves, and to conduct Miss P

to headquarters.” “ My dear fellow,” was the answer,
“you must not complain. You have only come out
to do your duty ‘pro aris etfocis'VtUs&a. British soldier.”
Your duty for the heiress and the stoves ! — it should
certainly take its place beside Person’s “ <nit\ rdde o65k
toAAo” among the few classical puns worthy to be
famous.

Russell could never remember how he came into
possession of the house in which he lived temporarily
at Balaclava. Every house in the place belonged to
the Army, and he had no right to occupy a square
inch without leave. But there he was, and soon
sailors charitably fitted boards to the windows, stuffed
up the chinks in the walls and floors and tarpaulined
the roof He slept on the floor, and all his belongings
hung from nails in the wall. His servants disappeared ;

THE AWFUL PLATEAU [Chap. XVI.

i8o

Virgilio bolted with the excuse of sickness, and Angelo
retired to Pera, where he set up as a provision mer-
chant. He was now allowed to draw rations, and
yet there were times when he was pinched by hunger
and cold. He chose a new servant, an Armenian, whom
he called Agapo, from among the motley immigration
of Croats, Armenians, and Greeks. Agapo stayed
with him only till he saw an opportunity of setting
up an obscure little bakery in Balaclava, where he
charged his late master double price for the crusts and
biscuits he occasionally sold him.

On December 7th, 1854, Russell wrote to Delane : —

“ Lord Raglan now and then rides out to the front.
He has not been down to Balaclava for a month, has
never visited a hospital, and never goes about among
the men. Canrobert visits the Kamiesch hospitals
and the men repeatedly. You hear nothing now but
grumbling against the General; but no one doubts
our ultimate success. One hour of Wellington, of
Napier, or five minutes of Marlboro’ or Napoleon,
would have saved us months of labour and thousands
of lives.”

One day a commissariat officer came with an order
signed “R. Airey,” for the surrender of Russell’s
quarters, which were required “on Her Majesty’s
Service.” Russell was confident that at that time he
could have aroused an outburst of anger at home by
a mere statement of the fact, but to his credit he
preferred to say nothing. He walked out into the
mud, carried his bed up to the front, and became
once more a wanderer, sometimes making use of the
tents of his friends and sometimes taking refuge on
board ship at Kamiesch or Balaclava He had, how-
ever, a short respite from the common misery when
he went for a holiday to Constantinople.

i8ss] RAGLAN’S CORRESPONDENCE i8i

Shortly after his return to the Army (January 6th)
he wrote in his diary : —

“ Raglan one never sees, and there is a joke in camp
that there is a dummy dressed up at headquarters to
look out of the windows while the Commander-in-
Chief is enjoying an incognito at Malta. Airey is laid
up with sore eyes, and lets the roads go to the deuce.”

If this was all true, it still missed a considerable part
of the truth. Perhaps these misunderstandings are
inevitable. Russell had no conception — how could
he have had ? for the thing was beyond belief— how
Lord Raglan was oppressed, victimised, almost
smothered, by the correspondence from the Horse
Guards and the Cabinet Day and night Lord Raglan
sat at his desk and wrote answers to nervous, tedious,
and unnecessary inquiries. No one guessed the
monstrous volume and character of that correspond-
ence, addressed to him by the Government, till
“The Panmure Papers”* were published in 1908.
Russell for his part saw only the sufferings of the
Army and noted the absence of the Commander-in-
Chief. All his chivalrous pity for gallant fellows in

* A ridiculous example of Lord Panmure’s method may be given.
On July lyth, 1855, General Simpson, Lord Raglan’s successor,
wrote to Lord Panmure : —

I think, my lord, that some telegraphic messages reach us that
cannot be sent under due authority and are perhaps unknown to
you, although under protection of your lordship’s name and not in
cipher. For instance, I was called np last night, a dragoon having
come express from St George’s Monastery with a telegraphic
message in these words: *Lord Panmure to General Simpson —
Captain Jarvis has been bitten by a centipede. How is he now? ^
This seems rather too trifling an affair to for a dragoon to ride a
couple of miles in the dark that he may knock up the commander of
the Army out of the very small allowance of sleep permitted him I
Then, upon sending in the morning another mounted dragoon to
inquire after Captain Jarvis four miles off, it is found that he never
has been bitten at all, but has had a boil, from which he is fast
recovering. I venture to mention this message because there have
been two others equally trifling, causing inconvenience, and worse
may come out of such practices with die wires.”

THE AWFUL PLATEAU [Chap. XVI.

182

pain or in misery was stirred, and he wrote at white
heat The sufferings of the Army no doubt could not
be exaggerated; he made no mistake there; but he
did not and could not know that when Lord Raglan
appeared to be keeping himself perversely or even
callously within headquarters he was weighed down
by that unparalleled imposition of clerical labour.

Of course, it may be said that Lord Raglan should
have refused the fatal immediate duty for the more
important one of ascertaining the condition of his men
and (above all) of building decent roads for the trans-
port of the commissariat to the front The only answer
possible to that contention is that it was Lord Raglan’s
habit of mind to see only his immediate .. duty. He
could not, indeed — for he was an experienced soldier —
withdraw his men from the trenches and set them to
labour on the roads ; as he himself said, to withdraw a
division would have been to do nothing less than raise
the siege; yet the exceptional general would have
found means (by specially imported navvy labour, for
instance) to make the indispensable roads. To say
that Lord Raglan was not the exceptional general who
admits the stress of no extenuating circumstances, is
not to offer a severe criticism but only to express a
regret Russell could not be expected either to per-
ceive or to acknowledge that distinction. If he had
not believed that nothing could excuse the infliction of
the sufferings he beheld, he would not have roused his
countrymen to the extent he did with his sincere and
passionate indignation.

As to the charge that Lord Raglan did not encourage
his men by showing himself among them and mani-
festing his interest in their well-being, it might seem
imfair even to set down the substance of Russell’s

i8S4-s3

DEFENCE OF RAGLAN

183

letters without opposing to it statements on the other
side. Thus in an article in the Quarterly Review of
January, 1857, the writer* says

“ He (Lord Raglan) replied that one aide-de-camp t
alone, who kept a journal, and who generally but not
always attended him, had accompanied him in forty
rides through the camp during the preceding two
months. In a letter, of which the testimony is above
all suspicion, because it was penned before the accusa-
tions against him had appeared, an officer relates that
Lord Raglan constantly made a nocturnal expedition
through the whole of tneir protracted lines, starting at
half-past nine, and returning to Headquarters at one or
later._ ‘ Some people,’ he added, ‘ think he might be as
well in bed, but the personal encouragement is a great
point. Another correspondent, whose letter was
dated after the attacks had commenced in England,
but before they were known in the Crimea, mentions
that these inspections were of five or six hours’ dura-
tion, and that though the cold was intolerable, he
talked to everybody, from officers down to privates.
The worse the weather grew the more frequent his
visits became He rarely missed a day, and never,
except compelled by the pressure of imperative duties.”

Again, it has been said that the reason why Lord
Raglan was not credited with going among his men as
frequently as he did was that he was not generally
recognised. And this was partly because he rode
accompanied by a single aide-de-camp, instead of with
the pomp and circumstance of Canrobert and Pelissier,
and partly because he wore a foreign cloak — a present
from Vienna — which concealed his empty sleeve and
disguised his characteristic appearance. If Russell
had ever heard this explanation he might conceivably
have answered that he could judge only by results,

* The Rev. Whitwell Elwin, the editor o£ the Quarterly^ who had
the use of private papers which have never been publish^.

t Probably Colonel Somerset Calthorpe, now Lord Calthc^rpe,
author of ** Letters from Headquarters,” 1857.

i84 the awful plateau [Chap. XVI.

and that Lord Raglan did not, as a matter of fact,
impress himself upon his Army at a time when it was
desirable that he should do so.

There is a further, and a contradictory, explanation
that Lord Raglan purposely abstained at first from
riding round all the divisions, as he could not bear to
see his tired soldiers turning out to salute him. But
may not one suppose, also, that without giving the
matter any very serious attention one way or the
other, he tacitly followed — at least, till he discovered
that he was expected to do otherwise — the example of
the Duke of Wellington ? It was never the Duke’s
practice to go much among his men in times of in-
action or comparative inaction ; according to his
reticent English habit he assumed that his troops could
require no more of him than that he should lead them
well when the moment came to advance.

About the middle of January, at all events, Russell
observed that Lord Raglan began to go about
frequently among the troops, and he recorded the fact
in public and private. He wrote to Delane : —

“ Balaclava, January lytk , 1855.

“ My De^ Sir, — Only you would look on it as
pure croaking, I would write you a long and dismal
letter as to the state we are in. This army has melted
away almost to a drop of miserable, washed-out, worn-
out, spiritless wretches, who muster out of 55,000 just
1 1,000 now fit to shoulder a musket, but certainly not
fit to do duty against the enemy. Let no one at home
attempt to throw dirt in your eyes. This army is to
all intents and purposes, with the exception of a very
few regiments, used up, destroyed and ruined. Lord
Raglan has roused up when too late. He has seen at
last, when too late, the terrible condition to which his
army is reduced, and he now thinks to mend matters
by issuing aU kinds of orders — for show and not for
use, because it is impracticable to carry them out My

i85S] the truth too TERRIBLE 185

occupation is gone ; there is nothing to record more
of the British Expedition except its weakness and its
misery— misery in every form and shape except that
of defeat ; and from that we are solely spared by the
goodness of Heaven, which erects barriers of mud and
snow between us and our enemies. While the people
expect every day to hear of fresh victories they would
-be astonished to hear that there is not an officer in
command of the trenches at night who does not think
of an attack by the Russians with dread and horror.

“ I cannot tell the truth now— it is too terribla As
the Colonel of a Dragoon regiment said to me the
other day : ‘ If we put all our chargers into the best
stables in England now we could not save them.
They must die.’ And so of the warm clothing for the
men — ^it comes too late. Of course, it would never do
to let the enemy know our weakness, or let our
enemies at home have the excuse of sa3dng they were
ruined by the information contained in our paper; and
yet I know nothing else to write about. Our trenches
are filled with filth and water ; we dare scarcely fire
a gun for fear of drawing the Russian fire on us. The
other day we fired one from the left attack on a
working party. The Russians gave us sixteen in
reply, and the other night I counted sixteen shells
exactly in the air at once going fi'om the town into the
French lines. I don’t know what to write about, and
I confess I am losing health and spirits in this
wretched affair, perhaps owing to a little taint of scurvy
which is going fast away. But I am getting as bald as
a roimd shot and as grey as a badger, and really
do long for home, and for a little relaxation. Just
imagine the ‘ authorities ’ who are directing a winter
campaign in a country which they were told would be
covered frequently with deep snow, never providing
such a swift and easily-made transport as sledges or
sleighs, and never thinking of them till the day before
yesterday! I am told on good authority that Lord
Raglan felt the remarks in the paper very keenly, and
his staff very wisely evince their sense of the outrage
by lowering their civility-meter to freezing point. I
also know that Sir R. England is preparing an
elaborate ‘refutation of the charges made against

THE AWFUL PLATEAU [Chap. XVI.

1 86

him.’ So be prepared for the thiinder burst. . . .
The lies in the papers are astounding. In the Observer
of the 31st December it was coolly stated the Army
had not been a day without fresh meat, and that huts
were being rapidly put up, when news must have
reached England long before that scurvy had appeared
from the use of salt meat, and that rations even of that
had been reduced on several occasions to halves and
quarters.

On January 21st Russell received the following
letter from Delane : —

January ^th, 1855.

“ My Dear Russell, — I am very glad to hear from
your letter of the 26th December that you are before this
again in the Crimea, for neither Chenery nor Eber made
any attempt to supply your place, and we have accord-
ingly ever since you left been entirely without news.
Don’t imagine for a moment, however, that I grudge
you your Very short holiday. No man ever better
earned one, I only complain that neither of the others
would even for a fortnight take your work, and that,
therefore, we have been left at a serious disadvantage
ever since you left Balaclava.

“ Probably before this reaches you, you will have
heard that I have at last opened fire on Lord Raglan
and the General Staff. According to all accounts, their
incapacity has been most gross, and it is to that and
to the supineness of the General that the terrible losses
we have undergone are principally to be attributed.
All this will, no doubt, make much commotion at the
camp, but I appreciate your position too well to ask
you to take any share in these dissensions. Continue
as you have done to tell the truth, and as much of it as
you can, and leave such comment as may be dangerous
to us, who are out of danger.

“ We hear that the assault was to be made on the
last day of the year, or thereabouts. I fear it will be a
veiy bloody affair whenever made, though I don’t
doubt of its success. I hope you may have been in
time to describe it.

“Did you get the buffalo robe I sent you? One
hears of so many miscarrying that one may be excused
for inquiring.

i8ss] THE WANT OF ROADS 187

“There is no news here. All is unabated anxiety
for the fate of the Army.

“ Yours ever faithfully,

“JOHN T. Delane.”

On January 21st Russell wrote to Delane : —

“His lordship (Lord Raglan) says, I understand,
that Filder* (the gay creature) has deceived him.
The Commissary-General wrote a letter on the loth
November calling the attention of Lord Raglan to the
state of the roads, and on the 24th he again alluded
generally to the transport of the Army, and said he
could no longer accept the responsibility of feeding
it, and must warn his lordship of the impossi-
bility of doing so unless steps were taken to place the
Commissariat on a proper footing as regarded transport
and the state of the roads and quays. In fact, Lord
Raglan knew nothing of what was going on, and he is
now alarmed at what he sees, and blames everybody
to excuse himself. There are strange rumours flying
about concerning peace or an armistice. Lord R’s
resignation, death of the Czar, eta, etc. They show
the ferment of men’s minds. If there were ten corre-
spondents out here, each could send you home every
day his own budget of instances of mismanagement;
in fact, I begin to disbelieve altogether that we are an
‘orderly’ and constructive people at all”

A few days later, in writing to Delane, Russell
said : —

“ Lord Lucan said to me the other day : ‘ Lord
Raglan ought to give you an annuity, for the Times
has roused him up out of a lethargy which was about
to be fatal to him and to us all, and he now takes
wholesome exercise 1 ’ ”

Although Russell was now less than ever agreeable
to the authorities, he made during the winter a great
number of firm friends among the regimental officers.
His tent, house, or whatever place he was using as a

• Commissaxy-General Filder.

i88

THE AWFUL PLATEAU [Chap. XVI,

habitation at the time, became a rende2vous for
innumerable officers who would drop in to give or get
the news or enjoy a chat and a smoke. His time,
indeed, became so much broken in upon that he was
forced to reserve certain hours for writing, and was
accustomed to put up a notice when he was thus
engaged. But his popularity was more powerful than
the effect of the notice. In his diary for January 22nd,
1855, we read ; —

“ Interrupted, of course, by fellows who don’t mind
a button the notice on my door : ‘ Mr. Russell
requests that he may not be interrupted except upon
business.’ ”

Among the things he was told by his friends, the
most frequent were (need it be said ?) various versions
of the threats provoked by his letters at headquarters.

“According to what I heard frorn people,” he wrote,
“ I was honoured by a good deal of abuse for telling
the truth. I really would have put on my Claude
Lorrain glass, if I could. I would have clothed
skeletons with flesh, breathed life into the occupants
of the charnel-house, subverted the succession of the
seasons, and restored the legions which had been lost ;
but I could not tell lies to ‘make things pleasant’ Any
statements I have made I have chapter, and book, and
verse, and witness for. Many, very many, that / did
not make I could prove to be true with equal ease, and
could make public if the public interest required it
The only thing the partisans of misrule could allege
was, that I did not ‘make things pleasant’ to the
authorities, and_ that amid the filth and starvation and
deadly stagflation of the camp, I did not go about
‘babbling of green fields' of present abundance, and
of prospects of victory.”

A few figures will convey better than an accumula-
tion of epithets a notion of how sickness and death
spread in the Army, In April, 1854, the number of

i8S4-S] the spread OF SICKNESS 189

sick in the British Army in Turkey and Bulgaria was
503. In July, when the Army was concentrated round
Varna, the number was 6,937. September i| was
11,693; in November, 16,846; and in December, 19,479.
In January, 1855, the number of sick reached the
appalling total of 23,076. The loss from casualties
was less than one-eighth of the loss from the sufferings
of the winter. There was a want of boots, greatcoats,
medicines, and shelter. Officers clothed themselves in
rabbit-skins, and the men in bread-bags and rags. In
this state the Army was exposed to continuous
artillery fire in the open trenches and to pitiless and
freezing storms. The plateau on which it was
encamped was “ a vast black waste of soddened earth,
when it was not covered with snow, dotted with little
pools of foul water and seamed by brown-coloured
streamlets strewn with carcases of horses.”

CHAPTER XVII

THE RESPONSE TO RUSSELL’S LETTERS

Day by day Russell chronicled the misery and
horror. The indignation and generous resolution
with which England responded to his letters make
a famous epoch in our history. The Government
explained away in public all that Russell wrote, but
took it to heart in private and bombarded their
generals at the front with panic-stricken inquiries
as to what could be done to save the Army and
their own reputations. The succour of the Army
before Sebastopol became the affair of both the
Government and the nation. But as the copies of
the Times in which Russell’s letters appeared began
to find their way into the camp Russell observed that
the faces of a few of his friends were “ darkening
and freezing like the winter weather.”

One day, Colonel Rose (afterwards Lord Strath-
naim) informed him that he had reason to know
that the letters were regarded at the Conference of
Diplomatists in Vienna “as great impediments to
peace,” because the Russians used the statements in
support of their contention that the Allies were
yielding. He said further that he believed it quite
possible the French generals would make representa-
tions to Lord Raglan on the subject and persuade him
to expel Russell from the Crimea. “What would
you have me do, then ? Write that all is well— that
the Army is healthy— that we want nothing, and

1855] RUSSELL ADVISED TO GO 191

that the Allies are passing quite a pleasant winter
before Sebastopol ? ” “ Well, no ! Not exactly that,
you know ! But there is no necessity to tell all the
world about these unpleasant shortcomings. Things
will soon come round, depend on it And meantime
you are doing no good.” It so happened that Russell
had just received a letter from Delane, in which he
learned that subscriptions and offers of help for the
Army were pouring in from every part of the
kingdom. He informed Rose of this, and added,
“ You see, I am here as a newspaper correspondent,
not as a diplomatist. I am writing for the Times,
and it is for the editor on the spot to decide what
ought to be made public and what ought to be
suppressed in my correspondence. As for the terrors
of expulsion, just look roimd and judge for yomrself
what pleasure I can find in my life here I " Russell
was sitting at the time on an old store box in a
pit about ten feet long and six broad, dug in the
ground and roofed by a battered tent doubled at the
top. A flight of steps cut in the ground led down
to this dwelling-place. Rose looked round and shook
his head. " Exactly I ” he said ; “ I agree with you 1
It is very uncomfortable; it must give you rheumatism.
If I were you I should go away! I would indeed ! ”
This was only one of the many hints Russell had
that his departure would be welcomed. Already the
Deputy Judge-Advocate, Mr. Romaine, had come to
him indirectly on behalf of Lord Raglan to express
the Commander-in-Chiefs serious displeasure at the
information afforded to the enemy in the Times.
In a letter written ten days before the bombardment
of October 17th, 1854, Russell had mentioned that
a stone windmill near the Woronzow Road was

192 THE RESPONSE [Chap. XVII

being used as a powder magazine. “You actually
told the enemy where our powder was ! ” * Russell

* Lord Raglan wrote as follows on this subject to the Duke of
Newcastle : —

“ Before Sebastopoe,

November i^th, 1854,

My dear Duke of Newcastle, — ^The perusal of the article in
the Times of the 23rd of October, headed ‘ The War,* obliges me in
discharge of my duty to draw your Grace’s attention to the conse-
quences that may arise from the publication of details connected
with the army. The knowledge of them must be invaluable to the
Russians, and in the same degree detrimental to H.M.’s troops.

“ I enclose the article itself, and a note of the principal points of
information which it affords, and which were probably forwarded to
and had arrived at Sebastopol by telegraph before the mail of the
23rd reached Headquarters.

“ You will perceive that it is there stated that our losses from
cholera are very great ; that the Light Division encampment is kept
on the alert by shot and shell which pitch into the middle of it; that
40 pieces of artillery have been sent to our park, and twelve tons
of gunpowder safely deposited in a mill, the position of which is
described, and which of course must be accurately known by the
enemy ; that the Second Division had moved and taken ground in
the vicinity of the Fourth Division, in which a shell had fallen with
fatal effect in a tent occupied by some men of the 63rd Regiment;
and that the French would have 60 heavy guns, the British 50, and
60 more would be supplied by the Navy.

“The mention of the employment of red-hot shell was then
adverted to.

“The position of the 93rd is stated, as is that of the Headquarters
of the Commander of the Forces ; likewise the possible dearth of
round shot, and of gabions and fascines.

“ I will not fatigue you by further ^uding to what is announced
in the letter, but I will ask you whether an^hing more injurious to
the interests of the Army could be effected than the publication of
such details ?

“lam quite satisfied that the object of the writer is simply to
satisfy the anxiety and curiosity, I may say, of the public, and to do
what he considers his duty by his employers, and that it has never
occurred to him that he is serving much more essentially the cause
of the Russians, and is encouraging them to persevere in throwing
shells into our camps and to attempt the destruction of the milT
where our powder is^ reported by him to have been deposited. But
the innocency of his intention does not diminish the evil he inflicts,
and something should be done to check so pernicious a system at
once.

“ I do not propose to take any violent step, though perhaps I
should be justified in doing so ; but I have requested Mr. Romaine
to endeavour to^ see the different correspondents of the newspapers
and ^ quietly point out to them the public inconvenience of their
writings, and the necessity of greater prudence in future, and I

A CAMP FOLLOWER

193

1855]

readily admitted and deplored his fatilt, but in justice
to himself explained that when the letter was written
Lord Raglan, like everyone else, was quite sure that
the Allies would be in possession of Sebastopol long
before the letter could reach London, He offered to
submit his letters to a censorship at headquarters.
“ I must, however, let the Times know the fact.” The
offer was not accepted.

Throughout the campaign he never exchanged a
word with Lord Raglan. When the Duke of New-
castle went to the Crimea, he asked Russell one day
if Lord Raglan had ever made any remark about
the attacks of the Times.

“ His astonishment,” writes Russell, “was unbounded
when I said, ‘ Lord Raglan never spoke to me in his
life’ ‘ What ! He never had a word with you all the
time you were here?’ ‘Never!’ ‘That is indeed
extraordinary — most extraordinary.’”

Russell did not think so.

“ I was regarded,” he said, “ as a mere camp-follower,
whom it would be impossible to take more notice of
than you would of a crossing-sweeper — ^without the
gratuitous penny. It never came to my mind to feel
either surprise or indignation on that score.”

A few extracts from “ The British Expedition to the
Crimea ” will best describe the miseries of that winter.

“ Rain kept pouring down, the wind howled over
the staggering tents; the trenches were turned into
dykes ; in the tents the water was sometimes a foot
deep; our men had neither warm nor waterproof

make no doubt that they will at once see that I am right in so
warning them.

^ I would request that you should cause a communication to be
made to the editors of the daily Press, and urge them to exansine the
letters they receive before they publish them, and carefully expunge
such parts as they may consider calculated to furnish valuable
information to the enemy.”

R,— voi« I.

o

194

THE RESPONSE [Chap. XVII.

clothing ; they were out for twelve hours at a time
in the trenches ; they were plunged into the inevitable
miseries of a winter campaign. These were hard
truths, which, sooner or later, must have come to the
ears of the people of England. It was right they
should know that the beggar who wandered the streets
of London led the life of a prince compared with the
British soldiers who were fighting for their country,
and who, we were complacently assured by the honie
authorities, were the best appointed army in Europe.
They were fed, indeed, but they had no shelter, "nie
tents, so long exposed to the blaze of a Bulgarian sun,
and drenched by torrents of rain, let the wet through
'like sieves.’”

“ Hundreds of men had to go into the trenches at
night with no covering but their greatcoats, and no

S rotection for their feet but their regimental shoes.

lany when they took off their shoes were imable to
get their swollen feet into them again, and they might
be seen bare-footed, hopping about the camp, with the
thermometer at twenty degrees, and the snow half a
foot deep upon the ground. The trenches were two
and three feet deep with mud, snow, and half-frozen
slush. Our patent stoves were wretched. They were
made of thin sheet iron, which could not stand our
fuel — charcoal. Besides, they were mere poison manu-
-fiactories, and they could not be left alight in the tents
at night.”

“ It must not be inferred that the French were all
healthy while we were all sickly. They had dysentery,
fever, ^arrhcea, and scurvy, as well as pulmonary
complaints, but not to the same extent as ourselves,
or to anything like it in proportion to their numbers.
On January 8 th some of the Guards of Her Majesty
Queen Victoria’s Household Brigade were walking
about in the snow without soles to their shoes. The
warm clothing was going up to the front in small
detachments.”

“We were astounded on reading our papers to find
that on December 22nd London believed the coffee
issued to the men was roasted before it was given
out I Who could have hoaxed them so cruelly ?
Around every tent were to be seen green berries.

195

1855] the winter SUFFERINGS

which the men trampled into the mud and could not
roast. Mr. Murdoch, chief engineer of the Sanspareil,
mounted some iron oil casks, and adapted them very
ingeniously for roasting ; and they came into play at
Balaclava. I do not believe at the time the statement
was made one ounce of roasted coffee had ever been
issued from any commissariat store to any soldier in
the Crimea.”

“There was a white frost on the night of January
22nd ; the next morning the thermometer was at 42°.
A large number of sick were sent into Balaclava on
the 23rd on French mule litters. They formed one of
the most ghastly processions that ever poet imagined.
Many were all but dead. With closed eyes, open
mouths, and ghastly faces, they were borne along two
and two, the thin stream of breath, visible in the frosty
air, alone showing they were still alive. One figure
was a horror — a corpse, stone dead, strapped upright
in its seat, its legs hanging stiffly down, the eyes
staring wide open, the teeth set on the protruding
tongue, the head and body nodding with frightful
mockery of life at each stride of the mule over the
broken road. The man had died on his way down.
As the apparition passed, the only remark the soldiers
made was, ‘ There’s one poor fellow out of pain, any
way I ’ Another man I saw with the raw flesh and
g kin hanging from his fingers, the naked bones of
which protruded into the cold air. That was a case
of frost-bite. Possibly the hand had been dressed, but
the bandages might have dropped off.”

“Yet people told us it was ‘croaking’ to state the
facts, or even to allude to them 1 The man who could
have sat calmly down and written home that our troops
were healthy, that there was only an average mortality,
that everyone was confident of success, that our works
were advancing, that we were nearer to the capture of
Sebastopol than we were on October 17th, that trans-
port was abundant, and the labours of our Army light,
might be an agreeable correspondent, but assuredly
he would not have enabled the public to form an
accurate opinion on the real state of affairs in the
camp before Sebastopol. The wretched boys sent out
to us were not even fit for powder. They died ere

196

THE RESPONSE OChap XVII.

a shot was fired against them. Sometimes a good
draft was received ; but they could not endure long
vigil and exposure in the trenches.”

Evidences of the effect of his letters in England
reached Russell in ever-increasing numbers as the
winter progressed — letters full of suggestions, of
abuse, of praise, from people he had never heard
of ; articles from other newspapers and accounts of
innumerable public meetings. Bales and cases of
presents for the soldiers also arrived, directed to the
“ Times Correspondent, Crimea.” There was a
pathetic ignorance among a great many people of
what the soldiers most needed, and Russell has told
us that there were far too many “fancy articles.”
There were pickles and sauces for men who had no
regular supply of meat or bread; and, above all, it
occurred to hardly anyone that Russell had no means
of transport for distributing these presents.

Although the supply of comforts and necessaries
from home was inappropriate and chaotic at first,
Russell had the satisfaction of becoming associated later
with the distribution of the clothes and other things
sent by the Times. As far back as -November, the
Times had opened a fund for the relief of the soldiers,
and in a short time ;^3o,ooo was subscribed. The fund
was placed in the hands of Russell’s colleague and
friend, Mr. J. C. MacDonald, afterwards manager
of the Times. “ He was,” in Russell’s words, “ a
large-minded, sagacious, warm-hearted and judicious
man.” He opened a store at Scutari, but even before
his arrival there, he actually provided proper under-
clothing and trousers for the whole of the 39th Foot,
whom he found after their embarkation utterly desti-
tute of proper equipment for exposure in the trenches.

1855 ]

A CHRISTMAS BOX

197

At the end of January, greatcoats, jerseys, boots and
so forth supplied by the Government, were distributed
at Balaclava. Numerous private persons and charit-
able associations had set themselves to work Lord
Blantyre, for example, equipped a ship with stores for
sale at cost price — of course to the indignation of the
sutlers and store-keepers. Finally there arrived what
Russell had asked for in a letter from Gallipoli before
a shot had been fired — a large band of doctors. And
no English reader needs to be told of the mercy
ministered to the sick and wounded by Miss Florence
Nightingale and her nurses, who had arrived just after
Inkerman and had gradually organised the hospitals.
Hers was no impulse of devotion applied at haphazard ;
she had carefully trained herself by resolute methods
before nursing was a humane and scientific study in
England, and long before she knew that she could
apply her skill in the Crimea.

Russell himself received many tokens of the estimate
his countrymen had formed of his services to the
nation in making known the condition of the Army.
A letter which appeared in the Dublin Evening Packet
on this subject explains itself.

“We all esteem him,” said the writer, “and we are
all sure that thousands who have never known h im
personally--whom probably he will never know or
meet in private — ^will be pleased to know we have
contrived to forward him a large ‘Christmas box’ to
keep firm a little domestic link with our old English
customs Our wives and girls have manufactured a
plum-pudding of a size the bore of no gun could
accommodate, and they have forced worsted into all
possible shapes and combinations that female fingers
could contrive on his behoof Many of his confreres
have filled up one third of the box with well-corked
bottles kept from breaking by bundles of cigars, and

198 THE RESPONSE [Chap. XVII.

the corners have been occupied by jars of potted meats,
whilst in the centre of a stout, useful saucepan — and
they are at a premium in the Crimea — we have wedged
a magnificent cheese. Besides these, we have added
German sausages and jars of butter, and various odd
little comforts in the way of lucifers, candles, soap,
tea, needles and thread, and buttons (the girls’ depart-
ment, again), a tiny medicine chest, some warm socks,
a gross of pens, a stone bottle of ink, a ream of paper,
and a few sprigs of English holly for his tent ; and
the large chest has just gone off to the steamer. Be
assured, sir, that we are as proud of him in London
as you are in Dublin.”

On February loth Russell wrote to Delane : —

“ Balaclava.

“ My Dear Sir, — MacDonald, who was here for a
few days, left yesterday after hasty visits to the front
with me and one ‘ night alarm.’

I heard that the headquarters people were so
indignant against the Times and all belonging to it,
that I thought it better not to send in my application
for permission to put up a hut, and I am still in
Balaclava. ‘ Transport ’ is the ruin of me — in common
with the army. It would require numbers of men and
ponies to get up the wood in the present state of the
country, and without a few soldiers to guard it, the
wood would be stolen. The French have the audacity
to ^y they are in huts and baraques, when I firmly
believe not one have they got up. I only see the mud
hovels they have learned to make from the Turks, and
their tents, in any French camp I have visited. It
is not true that Lord Raglan got any greatcoats from
the F rench as far as I can hear. * Matters are improving
here, simply because the worn-out men have succumbed
and the men not yet worn out are ‘ husbanded ’ now
that the authorities are frightened. I hope the facts
were known as to my rations. I received only what
anyone else in the same position would have received
had he applied for it, and it is all to be paid for at

* It was stated in French newspapers that Lord Raglan accepted
French greatcoats for his army.

1855] the stream OF ^^COMFORTS"

199

cost price Our Army is now doing its proper share
of work. While many poor devils were five nights
out of seven on duty, the French were five nights out
of seven in bed. Lord Raglan would not see that his
army vras overw^orked, and would not apply to the
French, who, of course, would not offer assistance,
and so they melted away till we have only skeleton
regiments and an array of ghosts.

I have begged of the people at headquarters wFo
are willing to serve us to send me a line whenever Lord
Raglan is stirring or of any news that occurs. We
hear his lordship is going home. But who is to
succeed him ? I sleep ^ every night in the buffalo
robe ; it is a most luxurious bed, and although I have
not received half my things I am very comfortable.
Will you be kind enough to ask Mr. Walter if he has
made any arrangement such as he was good enough
to suggest about the re-publication of my letters?
Mr. Whllans has sent on to me an offer ol ^300 for
the copyright of an original book on the war. In
execrable haste, as I want to ride over and have
another look at the Russians,

Yours always most sincerely and truly,

“ W. H. Russell.

“ The whole camp is boiling over with anxiety and
impatience for the news. Would you kindly say that
individual collections of comforts for the army ought
to^ be terminated, and that I cannot undertake to dis-
tribute any more things than those which are on their
way to me. The remnant of the army is ^ well found *
enough.”

CHAPTER XVIII

THE SPRING OF 1855

In the third week of February the news came that
the Czar Nicholas was dead, and great was the stir in
the camps of the Allies. But the Russians, as though
to prove that they were not disheartened by the omen,
fired on the day of the announcement more briskly
than usual. News which affected Russell more
intimately had arrived at the beginning of .the month ;
the Aberdeen Ministry, which for a long time, and with
progressive ineffectiveness, had been explaining away
Russell’s charges had at last succumbed to the force of
popular feeling. Roebuck’s famous motion for inquiring
into the state of the Army before Sebastopol had been
carried by a large majority. The violent political
tactics of “Tear ’em” had won for him the chief
triumph of his career, and the Aberdeen Government
was indeed tom to pieces. Roebuck had the crowning
gratification of being appointed chairman of the
Committee which was to hold the inquiry. It cannot
be doubted that Russell’s letters more than any single
force had procured the downfall of the Ministry.
When the Duke of Newcastle came out to the Crimea
he admitted this ; standing beside Russell on
Cathcart’s Hill one day, he said, “It was you who
turned out the Government, Mr. Russell”

The most important event for Russell of the next
few weeks was the arrival of a hut. When its dispatch
from England was announced he could think of nothing

THE HUT

201

1855]

else. “ Where is it to be put ? Will the authorities
allow it to be put up anywhere even if I can get it
carried there?” He gloated over the sketch of the
structure, accompanied by the directions for putting
it together which arrived before the hut itself, and
he prowled about vacant spaces searching for a
favourable site When the hut arrived he reflected
that he could as easily have carried St. Paul’s
Cathedral or the Tower of London up to the camp.
But help came. The Army Work Corps, which was
organised to put up huts for the soldiers, and to try to
make roads over the slimy morasses, had for its chief
a Mr. Dojme, who was a countrjonan of Russell’s ; he
offered to allow his men to erect the hut in their spare
time for a small payment

Russell had chosen a place behind Cathcart’s Hill,
not far from the curious cave in which Sir John
Campbell had established his headquarters. Greatly
daring, he directed the first wagon-load of cases to this
spot, and day after day hovered about dreading lest
some Staff officer should arrive with a peremptory
order for the removal of the humble building which
rapidly took on the appearance of a chalet without
a verandah or upper storey. It was square with a
sloping roof and with windows about eighteen inches
square on two sides, and it was divided by a partition.
The bigger room, or sitting-room, was about eight
feet by six feet, and the smaller room was to be a bed-
room. Mr. Doyne's men painted the roof and the
walls white, and Russell often heard envious officers
drop such remarks as, “That’s the Times corre-
spondent’s I I wonder why he is allowed to have it
here ? ” By-and-by he added to his hut a stable with
two stalls, and a smaller hut for the groom, who came

X 1J.JU, oriviiNijr ur i»55 L^hap. XVIII.

out to the Crimea about this time. By the summer he
actually had a small border of flowers, but he found
the spot inconvenient when the Russians took to long
range firing. One of their shells broke the end off his
stable, and when the war was over he was able to
leave a collection of twelve or thirteen shells which
had fallen round his domain. The wood and metal of
the hut made it extremely resonant, and when there
was heavy firing it became almost musical. The
vibration of gun firing at night used to shake up the
flies, which clung to the ceiling in swarms, and prevent
Russell from enjoying sound sleep. He could never
discover the ultimate history of his hut. On the day
he left the Crimea it was almost the last dwelling
before Sebastopol in which there was an inhabitant.
The soldiers’ huts were sold by the Russian Govern-
ment to speculators who were said to have made a
fortune out of the wood by using it for matches.
Russell’s hut was taken to pieces, re-packed and
shipped at Balaclava, and so far as he could learn was
landed somewhere in the Isle of Dogs, but he could
never trace it farther. He made many efforts to do so
as he wished to erect it on a little patch of ground
which the Duke of Wellington offered him for the
purpose at Strathfieldsaye — in memoriam.”

But the story of the hut has caused us to anticipate.
On April 1 8 th Russell wrote to his wife : —

" If I were likely soon to go home it would be a
great comfort and joy to me to travel back with you
and to show you a little of the world, and then we would
settle down, I hope, and I could write my book with
you by my side. I trust they would give me a couple
of months’ holiday. Indeed, I’m sure they would do
so. . . . Of my own future progress I know nothing,
but, of course, I never can and never will go into the

“DISAGREEABLES”

203

185s]

Gallery* again. I may succeed in getting something
when I reach home which will relieve me from my
uncertain and precarious tenure of an income and from
daily exertion, though I should always like a certain
amount of work.”

Five days later he wrote to Delane : —

“ My Dear Sir, — I trust if I am to remain out here,
you will be able to get me a servant, for I am per-
secuted by blackguard Italians, and now I have got a
really decent fellow he is going to leave me. Now
to-day, for example, it was understood that the troops
were going out for three or four days, and in order
to accompany them, I ought to have had a ‘good
horse (for I ride 14I stone, which is rather over-
weight for a Turkish pony), a pony to carry something
to eat, a field tent, as well as a sleeping-rug, etc, and
a servant on a pony to lead the other. But my
man flatly refused to^ go, and I could not make
him, and I was obliged to go ofF on a little
pony which, stout and nimble as he is, would
never have carried me three days running, and would
most likely have let me drop in among the Cossacks.
Of course, I could not have gone under such circum-
stances, and I must have returned at nightfall had the
expedition proceeded. Mind, I’m not grumbling, but
I want to show the disagreeables to which I may be
exposed on occasions. I believe nothing (short of
entering Sebastopol) would give the Chief more
comfort than to see me going off on the pommel of a
saddle belonging to a gentleman from the Don or
Ukraine, and I have certainly no desire to gratify him.
Ere this, you will, I trust, have seen Mr. Willans and
arranged for my wife’s passage out to Constantinople
if she be desirous and able to arrange to come. The
new house has arrived, and I have been one week

f etting it from Balaclava It is now in transition, and
think it will be up in another week As to Cardigan
and Lucan, they are arcades ambo. It was well known
they hated each other and never had spoken for years.
Therefore the Government made one the Generm and

♦ The Press Gallery of the House of Commons.

204

THE SPRING OF 1855 [Chap. XVIII.

the other the Brigadier of cavalry, because if one was
employed the other would be sure to trouble them in
the House of Lords. I saw with my own eyes the
Russians withdrawing our guns long before the charge
of Balaclava, but at the time it would have been
hopeless to attempt to stop them.

“ I am very seedy at times, though God be praised,
on the whole my health has been excellent. Won’t
you excuse my asxingyou if Mr. Walter has abandoned
the intention he expressed of editing the letters ?
I don’t like bothering him, but I would esteem it as a
kindness if you would ask him whether in the event of
his not being able to attend to them, he would permit
me to get them published by a friend. I have had
half-a-dozen letters on the subject, and I think I could
make a little money if the work was not too stale.
I fear I’m nearly used up now, and I want something
sadly to stir me up for the sake of the paper.

“ Yours very faithfully always,

“ W. H. Russell,”

On April 30th, he wrote again to Delane :

“My Dear Sir, — I have been bitterly inveighed
against (not to my face), because in the Times there
appeared a sort of comparison between my despatch
^d Lord Raglan’s in reference to the attack on our
lines. Colville* tells me that the Generals were
indignant above all things, and some of the staff were
idiotic enough to think the leader was (as if it could
be !) written by myself! These gentlemen say : ' The
fellow may as well take the command of the Army at
once.’ Colville, who is A.D.C. to old Simpson, tells me
these things, quite agreeing_ with the greater part of
what he relates. Since the investigations of the com-
missariat, the cocked hats have been furious against
the Times; every line in it is jealously scrutinised, and
if they find a mistake their delight is excessive. The
other day there was a leader on the indiscriminate

• Captam W. J. Colville, of the Rifle Brigade, afterwards Sir
iy. J. Colville. Hebecame Master of Ceremonies to Qaeen Victoria,
md Eactra Eqnerrj? to the Duke of Saxe-Ccdjurg-Gotha. He was one
jf Russell’s best mends in the Crimea. He was a clever artist, and
Russell preserved several of his sketches.

i8s5] A MISTAKE IN THE TIMES 205

loading of transports in which the danger of spon-
taneous combustion was pointed out, and the conse-
quent explosion of shells. The article gave intense
satisfaction, inasmuch as the cocked hats were able to
enjoy themselves intensely at the error of supposing
that shells are charged when they are sent out; the
fact being that the powder and fuses are not put in
generally till the shells are required in battery. . . .
It is very hard to get matter to write concerning the
siege, for really there is nothing doing. I have been
twice in the trenches and the batteries within the
week, and really I would recommend anyone who
wants peace and quietness to leave London and come
over to our traverses. The Russians and French,
however, pound at each other night and day. I am
getting quite used up, sick and seedy, and suffering
terribly from nostalgia. The iron house is splendid.
I am installed in great comfort, and I am making it
so comfortable that I hope to induce some vagabond
or other to do me the honour of coming up to the front
to wait upon me.

“ Yours very sincerely and faithfully always,

“W. H. Russell.”

About this time Russell began to see something of
Alexis Soyer, the chef, whose singular career has been
recorded in more than one book. Bom at Meaux, in
1809, he was trained as a choir boy at the CathedraL
But though his parents supposed that he would become
a priest, his inclinations lay, oddly enough, towards
cookery ; he put himself through a systematic course
and became cook in several well-known restamants in
France. Only once did he seriously waver from the
way of life he had so resolutely imagined for himself,
and that was when he became conscious that his voice
and dramatic talents promised him a successful career
on the stage On reflection, however, he preferred to
become the most famous cook in France After being
nearly murdered in Prince Polignac’s house in 1830,

206 THE SPRING OF 185 s [Chap. XVIII.

he came, a refugee, to London, and after some vicissi-
tudes became the cook of the Reform Club, where he
stayed for thirteen years (1837 to 1850). His advice
had long been taken and acted upon in the provisioning
of the Army and Navy, and in 1855 the Government
gladly availed themselves of his readiness to go to the
Crimea and reform the food system of the Expeditionary
Force. Although the author of “ The Gastronomic
Regenerator ” could cook a dinner that would send a
gourmet into transports of delight, he was even more
concerned to make the cooking of the people whole-
some, varied, and scientific. Having gallantly made
up his mind that he would instruct Englishmen in
cookery, he naturally never had time to return to
France. Some of the appliances he introduced into
the British Army are still in use.

When he arrived in the Crimea, he made haste to
put himself in communication with Russell, who
received this letter: —

“The London,

“ Balaclava Harbour,

“ Crimea,

“ 16/.^ May, 1855.

“ My Dear Mr. Russell, — I much regret not having
had the pleasure of seeing you on Monday at head-
quarters as I anticipated, but I resolved upon not
leaving the camp without finding out the ‘ Iron Castle ’
of the 4th Division, and which, I must say, is the finest
domain before Sebastopol. My proceedings of Monday
may not be uninteresting to you I had a long interview
vdth Field Marshal the Lord Raglan ; and submitted
to his lordship the plan of kitchen now in the
course of construction at the Castle Camp Hospital.
When completed the kitchen will have accommodation
to cook for 1,000 people. I also introduced to his
lordship several other plans of kitchens for the
different camp hospitals, and finally my camp kitchen

1855] SOYER THE CHEF 207

for the troops (to cook in the open air). His lordship
approved of my arrangements, and kindly promised
his support and assistance in my laborious under-
taking, as he terms it Subsequently I had an interview
with Omar Pasha, who took a lively interest in the
matter, and really gave me some valuable hints on the
suWect of camp cookery. Several gentlemen of the
staff were present during the conversation.

“ When the Clift or Castle Camp Hospital kitchen
is finished, his lordship will come and test the various
specimens I shall prepare upon the occasion for both
hospital and camp prior to introducing them generally
throughout the Crimea.

“ Miss Nightingale, who intended to visit with me
the Camp Hospital on Monday, was, I am sor^ to
say, detained on board from sudden indisposition,
being attacked with the premonitory S5maptoms of
Crimean fever. Mr. Taylor was in attendance upon
her, and called in medical assistance, Drs. Anderson
and Sutherland ordering her immediate removal to the
Castle Camp Hospital, where she remains. She was
conveyed upon a stretcher by eight men. Mr. Brace-
bridge and 1 being out of the way, Taylor accompanied,
holding an umbrella over her to keep the sun off her
face, and to-day we hear she is a little better.

“ I shall esteem it a favour if you will let me know
where I can address you, as if in the event of anything
interesting occurring I would immediately communi-
cate with you. To-morrow I shall be at Lord Raglan’s,
cooking various dishes out of the rations issued at the
hospital for his lordship’s inspection. I need not add
that should you in moving along the Harbour pass the
London, I shall be delighted to see you.

“ Believe me,

“ My dear Mr. Russell,

“ Very faithfully yours, _

“A SOYER,”

On May 15th Russell wrote to Delane: —

“ To show you the animus of some of my fnends
here, I enclose you an order I received from Colonel
Harding, the effect of which I the less cared about,
because I was removing my things as fast as I could

2o8

THE SPRING OF 1855 [Chap. XVIII.

to the hut in front before I received it. I saw Colonel
Harding, and he assured me he was very sorry to give
the order, but he was obliged to do so. It appears
Sir Colin, who is always squabbling^ with Harding,
required a list of all persons occupying quarters in
Balaclava, and when he saw my name— mortally hating
the Press in general, and the Times in particular, as
he does — he wrote off to Airey to say ‘ that a man
named Russell, a writer for the newspapers, was living
in a house which was greatly needed for public pur-
poses.’ Thereupon Airey ordered Harding to turn
me out However, as the house had been uninhabit-
able for weeks past, I gave it over with great alacrity.
I hear Lord Raglan was very angry at the publication
of the strength of the Army, and any officers who are
known to be friends of mine are constantly chaffed by
the Staff on the subject Layard, AD.C. to Penne-
father, finds his position so unpleasant on account of
the sentiments expressed towards his brother, that he
told me he would apply for service in the Turkish
Contingent.”

On May 22nd the expedition to Kertch started, and
Russell accompanied it The day before, he had
written to Delane: —

“The Expedition starts to-morrow for Kertch. . . .
I have just heard that little Gordon swears he will not
let me go, if he searches every ship in the expedition
himself . . . He certainly can stop me if he comes
across me, so I must try and avoid him. ”

“ The new correspondent of the Morning Post is a
purveyor’s clerk named Henty. The Daily News man
lives on board ship, or did so till lately, and the
Chronicle man I know not The Morning Advertiser
is rg)resented, I understand, by a Mr. Keane, who
chiefly passes his time in preparing cooling drinks.*
Sqyer has been boring the life and soul out of me.
Miss Nightingale is very weak. Pelissier is said not

* Other correspondents in the Cfimea were Mr. Nicholas Woods,
for the Standard and Morning Herald ; Mr. Crowe, who was artist for
the IHustraUd London News ; and Mr. &mpson, the artist, who brought
oat afterwards two fine volumes of iHustrations.

209

1 85 5] the KERTCH EXPEDITION

to be very cordial with my lord because the latter
does not like being bon ami’d and camaraded
familiarly.”

On arriving at Yenikale on board the transport
Hope, Russell wrote to Delane : —

^'Saturday, May zsth, 1855.

“ My Dear Sir, — As I was going on shore to take
up my quarters with the troops, I received a message
from Dr. Alexander to the effect that Sir George

Brown swore by G that if I ventured to set foot

on the beach he would put me in irons. I have written
to him to ask permission to go on shore, but have not
yet received his reply. The old brute is quite capable
of carrying out his threat, and though I would not care
a farthing about the esc^ade, it would expose me to
so much ridicule and chaffing that I could not remain
with the Army ; and it would degrade and lower me in
the eyes of everyone and gratify many enemies. I
have simply asked him if he has any objection to_my
visiting Yenikale. I must return to the Crimean siege
if he does not let me. Can you do nothing to put me
on a better footing with these angry old generals ?
I thought Sir George and I had Tieen better friends,
but little Airey and Hallewell, his Q.M.G.’s, are
furious against the Press. As things are looking up
they show their teeth more.

“ Yours very sincerely, in very much haste,

“W. H. Russell.”

Of course all the small people and oflScials take their
tone from the bigwiga

Two days later Russell wrote from Kertch to
Delane : —

“In my last letter I informed you of my position
with Sir George Brown, and that I had -written to him
with reference to my landing but had not received his
reply. I now enclose it to you, as well as some further
correspondence on the subject, to deal with as you
please. It appears that the threat he used was exagge-
rated en route, and ip is probable he may not have

R. — ^VOL. I. P

210

THE SPRING OF 1855 [Chap. XVIII.

spoken as he is reported to have done. But the
animus is evident — ‘ D the Press.’

“ Yesterday one Billy Smith, a man much feared and
dreaded here from his power of boring-, member of the
Reform, friend of Bernal Osborne, was found walking
about the French lines and was taken to Sir George
by an officer, and the former used him in the most
brutal manner. The Frenchman said, ‘ Mr. Smith is
welcome to go about the lines whenever he likes if you

will send someone with him.’ ‘ I’ll see him d d first

I don’t want the fellow here at all 1 ’ ‘ Then am I to

understand you don’t know him ? ’ ‘ Oh, yes, he’s a

respectable man, but I’ll have nothing to say to him.’
Hereupon Smith said, * I demand protection as an
English subject’ Whereupon old Brown exclaimed,

‘English subject bed d! I know nothing about

English subjects. I have only English soldiers to deal
with, and did not come here to protect anyone else.’
Old Smith threw his coat open and slapped his heart,
and said, ‘Sir George, shoot me if you like; I’m ready

for it’ ‘Shoot you be d d! Take him away'!’

And away the poor old boy was conveyed accordingly,
although he had a letter from Admiral Lyons in his

S ocket, and he was lodged in a house wherein I believe
e still remains. . . .

“ I have come down to Kertch and will go back to
Sebastopol by the first opportunity that offers. When
it is known. in camp that old Brown would not let me
land at Yenikale — for that is what will be said — I fear
the aggressive movement against the Press will receive
a fresh impetus. Had I gone ashore to-day, or since
I received the last letter, I would certainly have got
anyone who gave me shelter into a serious scrape.”

Russell saw enough of the almost unchecked looting
of Kertch to be furiously indignant, and he wrote a
letter to the Times at white heat. A most valuable
museum was destroyed, besides a great part of the
private houses. He was forced to write his account
of these events from the deck of his transport. It was
a gratifying moment for him when, some time after-
wards, Sir George Brown, stung by the censures

SIR GEORGE BROWN

2II

ISSS]

which the excesses at Kertch had provoked all over
Europe, called him to account for his letter to the
Times. “ You have made me appear to the world as a
barbarian — a leader of banditti. You should have
known that I was in no way responsible for what
happened at Kertch, any more than you were.” “ But
how should I have knovra that ? ” answered Russell.

Don’t you remember you issued a positive order that
I was not to land ? ” “I never did anything of the
kind.” “Pardon me,” said Russell; “a copy of your
order was placed in my hands at the time. It forbade
the landing of any person ' who was not on duty wdth
the troops,’ and I was refused permission accordingly.
So you see I am not to blame” Sir George Brown
made no answer for a moment Then he said, “Yes ;
I never thought you could turn it to account in that
way,” and dropped the subject

When Russell returned to the plateau before
Sebastopol he found his colleague, Mr. Stowe, whom
the Times had sent to take his place temporarily, dying
in the hut Russell had him sent at once to the
Balaclava Hospital, but he lived only a few hours after
his admission.

Russell wrote to Delane (June i6th, 1855) : —

“ I have received your kind letter of the 29th May,
which accompanied a letter from my wife informing
me that she would be on the road for Constantinople
on the loth June, so that she is five days gone by this.
I hope in God to see her soon and safe. ... We shall
have great deeds soon to celebrate. Our fire opens
to-morrow afternoon, and the i8th — a good day — is
spoken of for the assault The Staffites are all delighted
at an exaggerated version of the affair with Brown and
myself, which makes the General say, ‘_Mr. Russell, I

have no command by sea, but by G , if I find you on

shore I’ll put you in irons.’ ”

212

THE SPRING OF 1855 [Chap. XVIII.

In spite of these passages of arms, Russell retained
throughout his life (a proof of the impartiality which is
sometimes possible to Irishmen) a genuin'e admiration
for the resolute and gallant “ old Brown.”

He found several letters awaiting him at his hut
Mr. Mowbray Morris, the manager of the Times, wrote
about Mrs. Russell’s journey out to Constantinople :

“ As your wife is bent on joining you in the East,
and as you seem to wish that she should, I have made
a proposal to her through Mr. Willans which I sincerely
hope she will accept In general terms, it is this—
Mrs. Russell to have ;£’ioo from the Times, and to
proceed to Constantinople or the Crimea as soon as
she pleases ; you to have a month’s leave, dating from
the time your wife joins you ; at the expiration of the
month, you to return to your duties and she to Europe.

“ If these terms appear to you fair and just to all

E arties I shall be very much gratified-; but on the other
and, if they disappoint any expectation you may have
formed of enjoying, I cannot say the society of your
wife, but the pleasure of being within an easy journey
of her during the rest of your stay in the East, I shall
nevertheless believe that our plan is the one best suited
to your interest as well as that of the paper. If you
were an officer with a wife and young family in England,
I should never advise your wife’s joining you for any
length of time and leaving her children, except in the
event of your being seriously wounded ; and I cannot
see anything in your position which materially dis-
tinguishes it from that of an officer. There is every
disposition among us all to alleviate your separation
from your family in every reasonable way ; but I s hall
never cease to oppose your wife’s permanent residence
in Constantinople whilst the duties of your correspond-
ence require you to be with the Army. I acknowledge
that your case is a hard one, but it is not harder than
that of thousands of other good fellows, who submit
to fate with more or less grace, as you have done and
will continue to do. ... You shall have a servant, if
one is to be got, and he shall take care of Mrs. Russell
on her journey.”

MARTIAL LAW

513

185s]

Russell was tempted to regard Mowbray Morris’s
conditions as a rather unnecessary proclamation of
martial law. But on reflection he made allowances for
Morris’s habit of mind, which in business inclined to
formalism — a formalism that often seemed chilling but
was never meant to be so, for Morris was indeed one
of the truest and wisest of his friends — and naturally
he was grateful for the generous offer of the Times to
give his wife a round sum for the journey.

Another letter was from Mr. Walter, who informed
him that arrangements had been made with Messrs.
Routledge for the reprinting of the Crimean Letters : —

“ They have agreed to publish an edition of 5,000
copies at 5a. each, upon which you are to have a royalty
of 15 . id, per volume, or £2^0 for the whole edition.
Messrs. Routledge are of opinion that this edition will
fall far short of the demand, and in that case they will
publish a second edition in the same type, but in a
cheaper form, viz., at 2s. per volume — an edition of
10,000 copies — after which 3mu will receive a roj^altj"
of £10 per one thousand or £100 for the w^hole edition.
In the event of fresh editions being required, a similar
arrangement will be made with respect to them. It
is perfectly understood that this arrangement with
Messrs. Routledge is not in any waj" to prejudice any
future work on the historj" of tne war which 5^ou may
be disposed to publish on your own account.”

CHAPTER XIX

WAS RUSSELL UNJUST TO LORD RAGLAN?

On June i8th Russell was present at the general
assault by the Allies on the defences of Sebastopol.
Failure was complete and almost immediate. There
were many stricken souls that night in the British and
French tents, "and,” says Russell, “perhaps none felt
the bitter grief more than our chief, who sickened and
died ten days later.” The Allies had nearly five
thousand casualties. Russell’s generous heart knew
no relaxation of the concern with which he contem-
plated the sufferings of war, and perhaps he was as
much affected by the scenes when the burying parties
were at work after this assault as by any he saw in
his life. The narrow space which remained between
the rival works was seared and flayed with the explo-
sions of shells; the works themselves had turned
undreds of acres of land into something which
resembled on a grand scale the interior ramifications
of an ant heap; in the open space poor fellows, too
much weakened by their wounds even to crawl, lay
signalling their desperate needs with the feeble move-
ment of a hand or cap. Some had been there for
hn-ty hours under a burning sun. Walking in such
^readful places and hearing from both sides— for the
Allies and the Russians were ready enough to exchange
cmhtms and cigars during the armistices— the stories
of individual acts of devotion, Russell revolved in his
mind the possibility that the Sovereign might create

THE VICTORIA CROSS

215

1855]

an order of merit or valour. He even suggested in
one letter that the Order should bear the name of
Queen Victoria. When the Order of the Victoria
Cross was established in 1856 he did not venture to
assert that in this case post hoc was the same as propter
hoc, but at all events it was a special gratification to
him to know that the Order at last existed almost
exactly as he had conceived it.

This is perhaps the proper place to say something
on the charge that Russell was grossly unfair to Lord
Raglan and that he even hastened his end. It was a
charge which Russell was always ready to meet ; there
are numerous references to it in his public writings
and private letters. In discussing it, it is desirable to
answer the questions whether Russell exaggerated
what he saw in the Crimea and whether it was neces-
sary to sacrifice the feelings of a few persons in high
positions to the general good of the Army and of
England. If it can be shown that he attacked Lord
Raglan for acts or omissions which did not affect
essentially the safety and well-being of the Army, he
may justly be charged with having trespassed in a
province where he had no right to exercise his judg-
ment, and even with having pressed some animus
against a natural enemy. But Russell always posi-
tively denied that he stepped outside his legitimate
area of criticism. It is not, we suppose, to be argued
that his strictiu-es, made on the spot, were less useful,
if they were true, or required less courage, than those
which were made a great many years afterwards.
Students of military affairs know that Lord Wolseley
and Sir Evelyn Wood have denounced the neglect of
the Army in the Crimea in language as unequivocal as
his. But it may be said that they attacked, as was

2i6 unjust to lord RAGLAN ? [Chap. XIX

just, the culpable omissions of the officials at home
who made war without having prepared for it,*
whereas Russell attacked the generals and the Staff in
the Crimea, who were no more responsible for the
breakdown than he was himself; these, in common
with the soldiers under them, were not the authors,
but, in most senses, the victims, of a ludicrously
imperfect system. That is ground, however, on which
Russell was always ready to defend himself.

In “The British Expedition to the Crimea,” Russell
expresses his opinion about Lord Raglan in these
words : —

“That Lord Raglan was brave as a hero of antiquity,
that he was kind to his friends and to his Staff, that he
was unmoved under fire and unaffected by personal
danger, that he was noble in manner, gracious in
demeanour, of dignified bearing, and of simple and
natural habits, I am, and ever have been, ready not
only to admit, but to state with pleasure ; that he had
many difficulties to contend with, domi militiceqm, I
believe ; but that this brave, high-spirited and gallant
nobleman had been so long subservient to the power
of a superior mindf that he had lost, if he ever
possessed, the faculty of handling great bodies of
men, I am firmly persuaded. He was a fine English
gentleman — a splendid soldier — perhaps an xmexcep-
tionable lieutenant under a great chief; but that he
was a great chief, or even a moderately able general,
I have every reason to doubt, and I look in vain for
any proof of it whilst he commanded the English Army
in the Crimea.”

* “ That the soldiers were without clothes, shirts, or shoes, that
their tents were leaky, and that they had only a blanket to cover
them, was not, as has been asserted in some of the letters from the
Crimea, the fault of Lord Raglan, but of the Ministers who forgot to
forward proper supplies till so late in the season; and it is hard
ind^d for the Commander to have to bear the blame of a ne^gence
which has added immensely to his difficulties and made his position
more anxious and critical '* — Quarterly Review. December, 1854-

t The Duke of Wellington.

LORD DARTMOUTH

1856]

21;

In the appendix to his book, “ The Great War with
Russia,” Russell says : —

“Soon after the_ close of the war the Earl of Dart-
mouth thought fit in a speech to his tenants to accuse
me of using the most offensive language about Lord
Raglan in _ my correspondence. I immediately
challenged his lordship to point out a single passage
in any of my letters in support of his charge. The
Earl of Dartmouth’s reply was disingenuous. He
sought to fix on me the responsibility of articles
written in London when I was many hundreds of
miles away, and of which I knew as little as he did.
‘You were the correspondent of the Times I The
Times attacked Lord Raglan! Ergo, you attacked
Lx)rd Raglan ! Q. E. D. !! ’ It was a false and scandalous
imputation. I was led to look out every passage in
which Lord Raglan’s name was mentioned in ‘ Letters
from the Crimea,’ and to submit them to calm and
impartial men for their jud^ent, and I am prepared
to do the same to-day. Not one sentence, not one
line, not one word, is there to be found in my letters
in which Lord Raglan is mentioned in any way but
with the respect that was his due And subsequently,
in ‘The British Expedition to the Crimea,’ referring
to the silly, vague, and baseless babble in vogue
among certain sections of society on the subject, I set
forth with all the force of words of which I was
capable the sense I entertained of the nobility of Lord
Raglan’s character; but I did not shrink from express-
ing the opinion that he had the faults of his virtues
and of the amiable disposition that shunned argument,
contention, and stem resolves, and gave way under
pressure, and that he was not a great general. All the
letters I wrote from the Crimea as correspondent of
the Times, down to the death of Lord Raglan, were
published in 1855 — 6. Th^ are in every public
library, and can easily be referred to; and the same
remark applies to ‘The British Expedition to the
Crimea,’ to which there is an index. 1 say to anyone
who desires to know the truth, ‘Take and search
them through and judge for youreelf Liiera scripta

21 8 UNJUST TO LORD RAGLAN? [Chap. XIX.

The correspondence which Russell had with Lord
Dartmouth on this subject began in 1856 and was
continued at long intervals for twenty-one years —
with the help of dictionaries to establish the exact
meaning of words I Lord Dartmouth did not, it may
be said at once, quote any passages in which Russell
had written with violence or disrespect of Lord Raglan
personally; he was concerned rather to show that
strong judgments had been delivered on the “authori-
ties,” of whom Lord Raglan was the chief. But
perhaps justice can best be done to both disputants by
quoting certain letters from Lord Dartmouth : —

“ Patshull,

“Albrighton,

“ Wolverhampton,

'^January 26th, 1856.

“Sir, — I received two evenings since, but have
been unable sooner to reply to, your letter of the
23rd inst, in which you inform me that you are about
to leave town for a few days ; also that you did not
* bargain ’ for my making what I consider to be
necessary comments upon those extracts from your
writings which you expressed a desire to see — as it
seems to me a somewhat strange remark on your
part

“ Before, however, calling your attention to those
extracts by my comments upon them, I have to make
one or two observations. I will in the first place
refer you to Johnson’s Dictionary, of which you will,
I conclude, acknowledge the authority, for the meaning
of the word ‘asperse,’ which you will find thus
interpreted: ‘To bespatter with censure or calumny'
This, I think, fully justifies my former explanation of
the expression, as also my right to place my own
construction upon my own words. I also assert my
right to speak freely in public of communications to
a public newspaper, especially when, as I did at
Pattingham, I direct the attention of those whom
I address to the correspondence upon which I happen

ASPERSIONS

219

1856]

to be commenting. I will further take this opportunity
of informing you that many, nay, most, of those who
heard me at my Rent Audit dinner at Pattingham
were men of sound intelligence, some highly educated,
several as well informed on public matters as myself,
all, I believe, like myself, animated by a true English
hatred of injustice. Having said this much, I will
now call your attention to the enclosed extracts from
your writings, to which I have prefixed numbers for
the sake of more convenient reference.

“ In the first extract it is needless to point out to
you that the Admiral in command of the fleet (whose
conduct in that position I do not undertake either to
defend or to condemn) is ‘bespattered’ with direct
‘censure.’

“ I would in the second instance observe that I have
before now heard that the late Lord Raglan has been
attacked from other quarters for negligence in not
fortifying the weak position here described, but I have
likewise been told that men could not be spared from
other duties to strengthen that particular point.
However, one fact is conceded on both sides : that
Lord Raglan was fully aware of that weakness, and
that there might have been other reasons given for
the neglect of the warnings offered to him as one of
‘ the authorities ’ than those assigned in the passage
before me.

“ I consider that any reader of the Times would
decidedly believe that, although extract Na 3 does
not designate any individual by name, yet that the
language here used did very decidedly point to those
upon whose conduct that journal commented so
constantly and so mercilessly.

I have puroosely inserted into extract No. 4 a
sentence whitm may not at first appear to censure
Lord Raglan — that in which you state that he ‘ visited
Lord Lucan and went over the cavalry camp, etc’ —
because I do not choose to lay myself justly open
to the charge of having picked .out isolated portions
of your writings without due regard to the general
meaning of the passage in question ; and I here dis-
tinctly state that I understood this extract to mean,
whether taken by itself or in conjunction with the

220 UNJUST TO LORD RAGLAN ? [Chap. XIX.

other extracts, that Lord Raglan had before neglected
to do what might have been expected of him ‘ by every
branch of the service.’

“ No. 5, even if taken alone, must suggest to all who
read it that Lord Raglan did now what he had before
neglected, but, if it be connected with other portions
of your own writings to which I have already referred,
and more than this when published in a journal which
so unsparingly assailed Lord Raglan, it seems to me
capable of no other interpretation. These, Sir, are the
conclusions which I draw from the passages I have

S ioted to you. I need, I think, not add to them in
e way of further explanation.

“ But before I close this correspondence I wish to
observe that I do not pretend for a moment to deny
that you were on terms of personal friendship with
those oiBcers of the 46th Regiment whom you name,
nor to combat your statement that it was from them
that you received the contradiction of the report
reflecting upon some of those under their command,
to which you had previously given a world-wide
publicity — though I do not see that these facts at all
affect my statement.

“Now, Sir, having given you at much length the
grounds upon which I commented publicly upon your
writings as part of a system of which I heartily dis-
approve, I think that I have a right to hope that you
will modify, if not withdraw altogether, the very
strong expressions which you employed in your first
communication to me — for I have shown you that
I did not speak at random, and I feel that while
meeting your ‘ defiance ’ in a straightforward manner,
I have throughout employed a temperate and courteous
tone towards yourself personally.

“ I am. Sir,

“Your obedient Servant,

“ Dartmouth.

“P.S. — ^January 28th. Having been prevented
posting this letter yesterday, as I had intended, it
occurred to me to add that I have no wish or intention
to discuss with you the merits or demerits of Lord
Raglan or any other person — ^whether actually named
in each of the above quotations or not”

1856]

RUSSELL V. RUSSELL

221

Extracts from “The War,” by W. H. Russell,
Correspondent of the Times. Fifteenth Thousand.

I. i86. Almun^

We might have expected — or rather if we had not known how
unreasonable it would have been to expect much from such a source
— we might have relied on more effective assistance in our duty of
bur3dng the dead and collecting and carrying the wounded on board
from the Admiral in command of the FleeV^

2. P^tf 246. Battle of Inkerman”

*‘It must be observed that Sir De Lacy Evans had long been
aware of the insecurity of this position, and had repeatedly pointed
it out to those whose duty it was to guard against the dangers which
threatened us. It w^as the only ground, etc.” (here the nature of the
position is described). . . . “Everyone admitted the truth of the
representations addressed to the Authorities on this subject, hut
indolence^ or a sense of false security, and an overweening confidence,
led to indifference and procrastination.”

3. Page 279. Miseries of the CampaignJ^

“ In fact, I believe, nothing would so animate our men, deprived
as they are of the cheering words and of the cheering personal presence
and exhortations of their generals, and destitute of all stimulating
influences beyond those of their undaunted spirit and glorious
courage, as the prospect of meeting the Russians, etc., etc.”

4. Page 313. Daie, January iSik*

** Lord Raglan came down to-day to Balaclava— General Airey,
etc., etc.” “ Lord Raglan visited Lord Lucan and went over the
cavalry camp, which they had not seen since it was formed here.
Lord Raglan gave several orders calculated to promote the
conofort of the troops, and his unusual presence among the men has
been attended with the best effects, and has stimulated every branch
of the service,'*

5. Page 349. February lyth,

“ Lord Raglan visited a portion of the camp to-day. Scarcely a
day passes, indeed, on which his lordship does not now inspect
some part or other of the lines.”

“Patshuxl House, Wolverhampton,

“April ijth, 1877.

“ Sir, — I readily admit, though I confess that I do
not understand exactly the purport of the last para-
graph of your letter received this morning, that your
tone is most conciliatory and courteous — at least, as
far as your two l8§t letters are concerned ; and I also

222 UNJUST TO LORD RAGLAN ? [Chap. XIX

may explain that my not accepting your offer to refer
this ‘ case ’ to any third person was not due to want
of appreciation of the spirit in which you made it,
but to a feeling on my part that it might be possible
to give you such information and assurance (that
I endeavoured to do in my letter of Sunday) as
might render such a reference superfluous.

" All I wish to ask for from you is an assurance of
your belief in my own good faith in stating what
I believed to be true in the winter of 1855, and that
without in the least desiring to request that you
should take any course inconsistent with your own
self-respect; this being what I suggested in a letter
which I addressed to you some nine years ago — but
to which you returned a negative answer — then
seeing, as I thought, an opening for conciliation on
my part. And I will add only that I believed in
185s, as I must say I still do, that I was justified in
considering the late Lord Raglan to have had very
hard judgments passed upon his capacity and even
upon his humanity in the Crimea and at home ; and
I should like to remark further that in December,
185 s, your reputation as a writer of English was fully
established, and that you then were on your way
home with much fame and distinction. That there
was any hostility felt or shown towards you by any-
one in the Crimea I was not aware. But this I do
know, that some officers in the English Army felt most
keenly, in addition to their personal sufferings before
Sebastopol, the language employed towards them by
the Times, of which you were the accredited representa-
tive, and also that they entertained a strong feeling
with regard to your communications to that journal.

“I beg to remain. Sir,

“Your faithful obedient Servant,

" Dartmouth.”

Long after this correspondence Russell wrote in one
of the appendices to “ The Great War with Russia ” —

“ There was a personal charm about Lord Raglan
which fascinated those around him. The handsome
face, the sweet smile and kindly glance, the courteous,
gracious, gentle manner — even me empty coat-sleeve

i 8 ss] TRIBUTE TO LUKL»

that recalled his service in the field under his great
master, attracted attention and conciliated favour.
And if his winning ways captivated strangers at once,
it may be easily conceived that to family and friends,
to his young relatives on the Staff, and to those whom
he admitted to his confidence. Lord Raglan was an
object of the most affectionate admiration and regard.
Mr. Kinglake became his devoted friend and eulogist
in a few days, and thought the War in the Crimea
ceased to have any interest after Lord Raglan’s death,
for with that event he terminates his brilliant history.
There is a very characteristic photogravure in General
Hamley’s history of the expedition, representing Lord
Raglan and Pelissier together at a table in front of
Headquarters. Lord Raglan is in mufti, wearing a
soft felt hat with a puggaree, and easy jacket or
cut-away coat, vest, and walking trousers — the image
of a kindly English gentleman ; the French marshal is
in uniform, tightly buckled and buttoned in, a gross
eficier sort of man, his bulldog face full of vigour.
Contrast his features with the amiable lineaments of
the English General, and you will recognise the
difference between the two chiefs who sent their
columns to assault Sebastopol on 8 th September.”

Lord Raglan’s character, indeed, was patent to
everyone who knew him. The writer has had laid
before him a letter from Sir John McNeill to Lady
Rose Weigall about Lord Raglan’s death. Sir John
McNeill was one of the Commissioners 'who were
sent out to report on the sufferings in the Crimea.
Their report was resented by many soldiers, and it
led to the Chelsea Inquiry ; but as to the fineness
of Lord Raglan’s character McNeill was never in
doubt.

“Your letter informed me," he wrote on July 2nd
1855, of what on public as well as private grounds f
must consider a great calamity. . . . Even I saw
enough to make me feel how deeply and truly he must

With him. The time will come when all will

224 UNJUST TO LORD RAGLAN? [Chap. XIX.

acknowledge how much his country owed him and
when the friends who mourn for him will derive con-
solation from the reflection that he died as he had
lived and as he desired to live and to die, devoting-
the whole energies of his pure and noble nature
to the service of his country without one thought for
himself.”

In a letter to Sir Arthur Lyttelton- Annesley in 1894,
Russell pointed out that the thunder and lightning
directed against Lord Raglan from Printing House
Square had “ ceased to roll and flash for months before
the attack on Sebastopol of June i8th,” and that as
Lord Raglan died on June 26th he did not live to read
the Times article on that day’s fighting. That proves,
^t all events, that Lord Raglan did not sink under the
immediate weight of the attacks in the Times, whether
by Russell or by writers of leading articles. But
probably it was never contended in anything more
than a metaphorical sense that he did so. It has
already been admitted that Russell did not know, and
could not have guessed, what an immense volume of
pompous, fussy, and superfluous correspondence
engaged Lord Raglan s attention. If he had suspected
the truth he could not have allowed Delane to infer
that Lord Raglan was prevented merely by indifference
from visiting his men and the hospitals; but it would
still have been perfectly open to him to argue that a
greater man than Lord Raglan would have swept
aside that monstrous correspondence as irrelevant
and even impertinent.

Russell not only suffered much abuse in the Crimea ;
he made powerful enemies at home. The Prince
Consort wrote of him as a “miserable scribbler”;
and even some of his friends and declared admirers
remained in disagreement with him on many points

1854 - 5 ]

SIR JOHN ADYE

225

all their lives. On September 27th, 1856, Sidney
Herbert wrote to Gladstone: —

“ I ' trust the Army will l3mch the Times corre-
spondent when they read his letter of yesterday. I
think it the most scandalous performance I ever read.
While he admits that he cannot get satisfactory
evidence of any details, he brings the most serious
and disgraceful accusations against officers and men
who tmder circumstances of desperate danger, were
risking and laying down their lives. The Daily News
letter is written in a juster and fairer spirit. If they
were to hang Mr. Russell (alas ! there are no Pictons
in our Army), I believe the public here would be very
well pleased, provided the Times found another man
who could amuse them as well.”

That was an entire misconception not only of the
feeling of the public about Russell but of that of
the rank and file of the Army. The exaggeration of
the letter is excusable only because it was private and
because Sidney Herbert suffered even more than
most Secretaries for War. Had he not been held
responsible for the ghastly sufferings of the winter of
1854 — s ? Yet though he protested under the blows he
learned his lesson, as everyone knows, right well and
honourably, and associated his name for ever with the
great and humane reforms of 1859.

Let us quote now from a temperate letter written by
Sir John Adye a few years after the Crimean War ; —

“ Much as I admire your writings and often as I
have defended you (for you get plenty of attack in
this country), still I must say 1 differ from you
materially on some points, as regards the Crimea ; in
none more so, than in your estimate of Lord Raglan
and the higher officers of the Army. It is my
conviction that Lord R. was in every way a greater
man than any other that stood in front of the Allied
Armies. I believe if you were at this moment to
ask Canrobert, Marmora, Omar Pasha, Pelissier and

K. — ^VOL. I, Q

226 UNJUST TO LORD RAGLAN ? [Chap. XIX.

others, they would admit it. Lord Lyons told me the
same thing. Then, again, as to the condition of our
armies in the winter, I don’t for a moment dispute the
facts. I will take all you say on that point for gospel;
but when I come to the cause, I can’t throw it upon
the individuals on the spot, but upon previous
national neglect. If England wants to take part in
Continental wars she must study and prepare
beforehand. Lord Raglan and others were hunted to
death, and there are many other men of rank, whose
lives are embittered by having the responsibility of
the disastrous state of affairs imputed to them. I
conceive that this is a blot upon the character of the
people of England. The advantages of a free Press
are great and incalculable, but it has great drawbacks
in its power of misleading at critical, hasty moments.
These are the subjects on which I dwell, but I won’t
inflict any more of my book on you. If you like or
have time to skim over it, and would return it to me
with any opinion you can give me, I shall be glad.
Although I speak plainly and perhaps stroi^ly in it, it
is never my intention or wish to be offensive or
personal.”

Kinglake’s history has often been laid imder
contribution to prove that RusseU was unjust, and yet
Kinglake himself, as will be seen from the following
letters, did not hold the opinion which his writings
are used to support.

“23, Hyde Park Place,

“ Marble Arch, W.

“ October Sth , 1880.

“ My Dear Russell, — I hope you will kindly receive
from me the copy of my ‘Winter Troubles volume
which I have directed my publishers to send you.

“ Of course, I have had to speak much of you, but
considering that you and I got to be, as it were, on
opposite sides, I venture to hope that on the whole
you will be pleased with what I say. At all events, I
have intended to write in the most kindly spirit, never
ceasing to remember with pleasure and interest the

227

1854-5] KINGLAKE AND DELANE

days when we were thrown together at the English
Headquarters.

“ Very truly yours,

“A. W. Kinglake.”

“3, York Piace, Sidmouth, Devon,

October zyth, i 88 o.

“My Dear Russell, — You hail from the extreme
north, and I, as you see, from the west, but when we
are both of us in London once more, it will, be a great
pleasure to me to do as you say, and ‘renew the
acquaintance we had on the plateau of Sebastopol.’
I am glad you so far liked a part of what I said in my
note as to wish that the words had been written on the
fly-page of the volume ; and I am only sorry that my
use of the phrase ‘ opposite sides of the question ’
should have led you to think that I connected you in my
mind with the invectives of the Times. Far from doing
so, I have gone rather out of my way to disconnect
you with them; and I am pleased with myself for
having anticipated what I see from your note is your
wish, by writing the words you will see at the foot of
p. 259 and at the top of p. z6o. The words were drawn
from me by seeing how favourably the tone of your
letters to the Times contrasted with the leading articles.

“ I remain,

“ My dear Russell,

“ Very truly yours,

“ A W. Kinglake.”

After reading the volume which Kinglake had sent
to him, Russell wrote : —

“ 18, Summer Place, Onslow Square,
“South Kensington, S.W.,

“ November 1880.

“ My Dear Kinglake, — I have, since I wrote to you,
read over your new volume very carefully, and I
cannot conceal from you the pain I felt at the general
impression your invective would convey that my fnend
Delane was governed by some unworthy motives in
the course he gave to the policy of the Times in the
winter of 1854 — 5, and the sharpness of that pain,
mingled with regret, is not at all diminished by my
recognition of the kindliness which marks your

228 UNJUST TO LORD RAGLAN? [Chap. XIX.

appreciation of my position at the time, though I own
my memories of the period referred to are much more
fraught with sorrow than with merriment* As to
the language of the Times, I have not a word to say
more than this — that no one suffered much more acutely
than I did from its results, as an indiscriminating
public and the vindictive and powerful friends of those
who were assailed, laid at my door all the responsi-
bility of the assaults delivered on Headquarters and
the Ministry. I was accused then, and I believe that
many yet alive hold me guilty, of ‘ hounding ’ — that
was the phrase — of hounding Lord Raglan to death.’
For so much of justice as you have done me I am
grateful. I let the Times speak for itself. My con-
nection with it has ceased, not wilfully on my part,
but I shall ever retain for Delane the deepest affection,
and although I do not venture to defend his memory,
I feel bound to deal presently with some of the matters
put forward in ‘ The Winter’s Troubles ’ — troubles
which have cast a shadow on the whole life of

“ Yours truly,

“W. H. Russell.”

This letter was highly characteristic of Russell. He
refused to accept, without protest, a salve to his own
feelings which was offered at the expense of his friend’s
reputation.

One more letter from Kinglake may be quoted to
show how careful he was to dissociate himself from
the attacks on Russell : —

“Wilton House, Taunton,

February /^th, i88i.

“My Dear Russell, — I last night saw for the first
time the last number of the Edinburgh Review, and I
hope you will be able to imagine the astonishment, not
to say horror, with which I learned that it was supposed
that a savage sentence I wrote about the writer (quite
unsown to me and quite unguessed at) of a 'leading
article ’ was meant to apply to you ! ! ! Not for worlds,

• Kinglake, in a passage which is quoted later, wrote of Russell's
well-known humour, and of the divine mirth ” which he caused
in camp.

1854 - 5 ] RUSSELL WITHOUT MALICE

229

my dear Russell, could I have been guilty of such an
atrocity, for atrocity it would really have been. How
such a mistake could have occurred I cannot imagine,
for I referred to the writer of the article as one of
whom I did not know whether he was living or dead,
and the whole mass of writing in which the savage
passage occurs related to the ‘ articles ’ and noi in any
way to the correspondents. The mistake is so extra-
vagant that I ought hardly perhaps to trouble you with
this letter, but I feel that without doing so I could
not rest

“ Believe me, My dear Russell,

“ Very truly yours,

“A. W. Kingi*ake.”

Opinions and letters might be quoted indefinitely.
The conclusion which is offered here, without further
delay, is that Russell could never have written with
malice because he had not a grain of malice in his
nature. He was animated in the Crimea by the
simplest emotions — a vast pity and a generous indig-
nation. If he ever sacrificed individuals he did so
accidentally, or indirectly, in his general exposure of
the mismanagement of the Army. It would be absurd
to pretend that he was right in every detail of his
criticisms ; he was human — ^very human — and he was
an Irishman. But it is safe to say, that but for his
courageous testimony Englishmen would never have
heard of the real condition in which their soldiers
lived and died upon that terrible plateau before Sebas-
topol, would never have leaped with splendid anger to
the rescue, and finally, would never have learned that
the English troops did something far nobler than merely
second the enterprise of the French Army. But more
of this presently ; here it is only proper to say that,
so far as the heart of one man may be examined by
another, Russell was guiltless of any calculated
injustice to Lord Raglan.

CHAPTER XX

THE REDAN AND AFTER

A FEW days after the unfortunate assault of June i8th,
Russell was cheered by receiving a sort of Round Robin
of good wishes from the Fielding Club. Thackeray
was among those who wrote on the small sheet of
paper. The Secretary of the Club started off with—

"The News Secretary of the Home Department of
the Fielding trusts that the corresponding member at
Balaclava, Kertch, and in short, at any place between
here and Seringapatam, continues in good health,
possessed of clear ink, well-nibbed pens, and general
serenity, and that he may soon return to his anxious
friends and expectant country with all his luggage and
his former spirits.”

Thackeray wrote :

" I have just come from the Administrative Reform
Association, held in Drury Lane, where I heard your
name uttered -with enthusiasm, and heard with (‘ heard,’
by the way, is not pleasing coming twice in this way,
but Albert Smith is making a deuce of a row) received
with applause. We all wish you back here almost as
much as you wish it yourself. I am going to America,
so I shan’t see you unless you come back soon ; but
in every quarter of the world,

" I am yours very truly indeed,

" W. M. Thackeray.”

At the end of June Russell went to Constantinople
to meet his wife. He took passage in the transport
Brandon armed with this chilling permit : —

“H.M.S. Triton,

June 2 $th, 1855.

Receive on board the ship you command, Mr. W.
H. Russell, for a passage to Constantinople, but the

1855] CONTRACT WITH A SERVANT 231

Government is not to be put to any expense on his
account, ‘ This order is given on the imderstanding
that the accommodation of officers and others on duty is
not to be interfered with. The cabin is already as full
as it should be.

" L G. Heath,

“ Principal Agent of Transports.

“To the Master of the Transport Brandon.”

While Russell and his wife were staying at Therapia,
enjoying the breezes of the Bosphorus, he heard from
Delane that his book ‘makes a very pretty volume,
and Routledge promises it a success exceeding that of
any of his previous publications.’ Mrs. Russell had
been accompanied from England by a servant, John
King, engaged to enter Russell’s service, and it is
amusing to read the solemn bond and covenant
by which Mowbray Morris attempted to lessen the
chance of his vanishing along the path of Angelo and
Virgilio. Surely no other war correspondent has ever
had a servant tied to him by such an impressive and
exact document !

“ Memorandum of an Agreement made this eleventh
day of July one thousand eight hundred and fifty-
five. Between John King of the Queen’s Road
West Regent’s Park in the County of Middlesex
valet of the one part and Mowbray Morris of
Printing House Square in the County of Middlesex
Esquire on behalf of the Proprietors of the Times
Newspaper of the other part as follows, that is
to say :

“ The said John King, for the consideration herein-
after contained on the part of the said Mowbray
Morris, doth hereby promise, covenant, and agree
with, and to the said Mowbray Morris, that he, the
said John King, shall and will forthwith proceed to
the Crimea and when, and so soon as, he shall arrive
there shall serve such correspondent or correspondents
for the time being of the said Times newspaper as the
said Mowbray Morris shall direct and appoint in the

xvr-i-'rt.iN AiNjL» [Chap. XX.

capacity of groom and valet, and that he will attend upon
such correspondent or correspondents in such capacity
in every respect either in the field or elsewhere as may
be required. And further that he, the said John
King, shall and will proceed to the Crimea in such
vessel as the said Mowbray Morris shall appoint, and
immediately on his arrival there enter upon his duties
as such groom and valet as aforesaid. And the said
Mowbraly Morris in consideration of the covenants
herein before contained on behalf of the said John
King doth hereby for himself covenant, promise, and
agree with, and to the said John King that he, the said
Mowbray Morris, shall and will well and truly pay
unto the said John King the sum of eight pounds per
month to commence and be paid immediately from the
date above written, one moiety of such sum to be paid
to the said John King in the Crimea, and the other
moiety to be paid in London to such person or persons
as the said John King shall by any writing under his
hand direct or appoint. And the said Mowbray Morris
shall and will pay to the said John King the annual
sum of twenty poimds over and above the sum of
eight pounds per month, and shall also pay the
expenses of and relating to the passage of the said
John King from this country to the Crimea, provided
ALWAYS that if the said John King quit the service of
any such correspondent or correspondents in the
Crimea or elsewhere without giving previous reason-
able notice, or shall be dismissed for misconduct from
the service of such correspondent or corre^ondentfe,
then and in either of such cases the said John King
shall forfeit all claim to any wages which shall or may
be due to him at the time of such desertion or discharge
for the then current month, provided always that if
the said John King shall be discharged from such
duties as aforesaid by any such correspondent or
correspondents as aforesaid in consequence of his
services being no longer required, then the said
Mowbray Morris shall pay the expenses relating to
the passage of the said John King from the place
where he shall be so discharged to some portion in
Great Britain, as witness the hands of the said parties
to the day and year first above written.”

WINDHAM

233

1855]

After his return to the Crimea, Russell watched the
battle of the Tchemaya on August i6th, and then
waited with the waiting camp till September 8th, when
a cup as bitter as that of June i8th was drained to the
dregs by the British Army. The day before the
memorable assault on the Redan Russell happened to
be on Cathcart’s HilL

“Among the officers on the hill,” he writes, “were
Windham and Crealock. As I drew near I was greeted
with the usual question, ‘Well, what news have
you ? ’ It was supposed that I, who was told nothing,
must know everything. Oftentimes when we were
turned out at night by heavy firing in the trenches,
and everyone was asking, and no one was answering,
what it was all about, I heard someone say, ‘We will
know about it when the Times arrives ! ’ I was for
ever divided between the business of riding about the
camps, visiting quarters, gathering news, seeing what
was to be seen, and putting what I saw and heard
down upon paper. On the present occasion I was
unusually fortunate, for my friends actually knew
something. They were ‘on duty ’ to-morrow. What
I learned from them made me feel very dubious about
ovu* success. ‘ It is all a d— d patchwork business,’
said Windham ; ‘all wrong — no sense in it ! Why not
let the Guards and old Colin Campbell’s Highlanders,
who have done nothing all the "winter, spring, and
summer, go in at the Redan? There are lots of
regiments longing to make up for their ill-fortune in
being late for Alma and Inkerman — eight or nine fine
regiments burning for a chance ! It’s a selection of
the unfittest.’ It surely was not the survival of many
of them, poor fellows ! ”

Sir James Simpson, who with much reluctance and
humility had succeeded to the position of Lord Raglan,
entrusted the arrangements for the attack to Sir W.
Codrington and General Markham. Russell’s narrative
of the attack on the Redan was as spirited a piece of
writing as any he sent from the Crimea He told how

234 THE REDAN AND AFTER [Chap. XX

the French slipped across the few yards which divided
their foremost trench from the enemy and seized the
Malakoff before the surprised Russians had time to
bring reinforcements to the support of the too few
men who held this essential position, and then he
turned to the different picture of the heroic but fruit-
less attack by the British on the Redan. Those who
entered the Redan were left almost unsupported, and
Colonel Windham, in desperation, at last determined
to leave his men in their extremity, in order to go back
to the fifth parallel and implore help from Sir William
Codrington. Meanwhile the force at the Redan was
weakening before the continuous flow of Russian
reinforcements.

“ The solid weight of the advancing mass, urged on
and fed each moment from the rear by company after
company, and battalion after battalion, prevailed at
last against the isolated and disjointed band, which
had abandoned that protection which unanimity of
courage affords, and had lost the advantages of disci-
pline and obedience. As though some giant rock
advanced into the sea, and forced back the agitated
waters that buffeted it, so did the Russian columns
press down against the spray of soldiery which fretted
their edge with fire and steel, and contended in vain
against their weight. The struggling band was forced
back by the enemy, who moved on, crushing friend
and foe beneath their solid tramp. Bleeding, panting,
and exhausted, our men lay in heaps in the ditdi
beneath the parapet, sheltered themselves behind
stones and in bomb craters in the external slope of the
work, or tried to pass back to our advanced parallel and
sap, having to run the gauntlet of a tremendous fire.”

Russell’s narrative was not only an exculpation but
a laudation of Windham. When he had returned to
England people used to say to him, “ Windham is
your general” “ But,” vnites Russell, “it was the

CODRINGTON

255

18SS]

public who insisted on making him a hero, not I.”
Nevertheless, no one comes so well out of Russell’s
narrative as Windham.

According to Russell, Codrington beheld the
struggle, which lasted nearly an hour, without making
such attempts as might and ought to have been made
to support Windham. When W^indham came back,
appeared on the top of the fifth parallel, and entreated
Codrington to give instant support, the latter had, in
Russell’s belief, “ lost for the time being the coolness
which characterised him.” It may be said, however,
that the assault on the Redan could hardly have suc-
ceeded in any case. It was undertaken by a column
of one thousand men, composed of scraps of various
regiments, and disposed in such a way that Lord
Wolseley has called the movement “ crazy, ignorant,
and childishly conceived and badly executed.”*

It is convenient at this point to look forward a little
and quote from a letter which Delane wrote after
Russell’s account of September 8th had become public
property not only in England but in the Crimea : —

"I wrote to H.t all details as to the circumstances
of Simpson’s recall and Codrington’s appointment,

* The writer has had the opportunity of looking through a long
private correspondence between Sir William Codrington and Lord
Stratl^aim about the assault on the Redan. From this, and firom
Codrington’s report of the assault (which has never been published},
it is obvious that supports were not only sent from the fifth parcel,
but that they were sent in what was considered the best formation.
Immediately they emerged from the parallel, however, they came
under an extremely heavy fire. The casualties were terribly severe,
and it seems probable that the formation was at once shattered.
Lord Stratfanaim’s statement in the House of Lords, in 1871, that
the attack was delivered in a single line without supporte, CMnot be
justified. Russell was very much nearer the mark in raying that
the supports were “ without order of formation " ; for so in fact they
were when seen by him, or at all events by those on vdiose informa-
tion and judgment he was compelled to rely.

t One of Russell’s collei^es.

236 THE REDAN AND AFTER [Chap. XX.

and need not, therefore, repeat them ; but I enclose a
letter from Codrington which reached me on the very
day on which it was determined that he should succeed
Simpson. As you will see, I did not publish it, but I
wrote him a civil letter enclosing the article, in which
I announced his appointment, and telling him that it
would startle his friends here if they found their new
Commander-in-Chief corresponding with a newspaper
already. I do not think he has anything substantial
to complain of, and, indeed, all private accounts make
his case worse than you did ; but we are getting a bad
name, not only in the camp but here, for severe criti-
cisms, or, as it is called, ‘ abuse,’ and it would, perhaps,
be well, at least for the present, to adopt a more
measured tone. As you are universally admitted to
have killed Raglan and dismissed Simpson, you may
fairly rest on your laurels and patronise Codrington
until he does something flagrant.

“ People here admit that it is a ' leap in the dark ’ ;
that he has not done enough to entitle him to the
command ; but they declare that. their choice was only
between third-rate men, and they took the one which
seemed the best. If you can, pray say something of

poor old Campbell.* Such fellows as affect to

depreciate him as a mere sergeant-major, but I sus-
pect his chief fault in their eyes is that he is not
‘one of us’ — ^that he is a soldier by profession, and
that, moreover, not sparing himself, he does not spare
those below Him. My own impression is that he is
not adequate to the chief command ; but it is too bad
that his claims should be talked away by these
butterflies.

“ I don’t meddle with the answer to your suggestion
of a short holiday at Christmas, because the Manager
will write to you on that point, and I need not assure
you that I shall be delighted to see you here again like
all the rest, ‘on urgent private affairs.’! ... I hope
your wife sent you Emmanuel’s gold medal. Certainly
no one deserves a medal more than you do, but I would
rather have had the Queen than the Jew to present it”

* Sir Colin Campbell, afterwards Lord Clyde.

t This was the phrase commonly used as an excuse by ofScers
who returned to England on leave during the campaign.

CODRINGTON’S LETTER

237

185s]

On reading Codrington’s letter to Delane, Russell
wrote to Codrington to protest that in criticising him
he had acted without malevolence and had honestly
tried to set down only what he believed to be true in
substance and in fact Codrington wrote in answer the
following letter, upon the dignity and self-restraint of
which there is no need to insist

“ December 2nd, 1855.

“Sir, — I have not very much time for private
correspondence, but I am unwilling not to answer
such a letter as that which you have sent to me.
Mr. Delane has written to me. He did not publish my
letter, but he sent a copy to you.

“ I have no reason to think that anyone on earth has
malevolence towards me, or would wish to slander me
But see what has happened ; I felt, and still strongly
feel, that a remark, hurried or casual as it might be in
intention, is not so when printed, circulated through
the world, and read with the eager interest attaching
to all connected with the war. This remark, this
casual remark, which you may have founded on the
information or opinion of those mixed up in the excite-
ment of such a fight, imorant of, and certainly not
incurring the responsibility by which the lives of
himdreds were to be exposed or saved — this remark
was made the foundation of still stronger comment on
personal conduct in the very paper with which you
correspond ; and, on the same foundation, other papers
contained remarks stUi more gross. I cannot enter
into the question as between editors and correspon-
dents. I have not the least idea of intentional mis-
representation or malevolence or ill-will on your part
or that of others ; but I know the pain — the indignant
pain — ^with which those statements were read. It is
no use my continuing further. I have now other
things to think of, but I repeat I have no idea of your
being influenced by any unworthy motives.

“ Yours faithfully,

“ W. Codrington.”

Of unworthy motives Russell may indeed be
acquitted, as any man should be who openly accepts

238 THE REDAN AND AFTER [Chap. XX.

odium for the sake of setting the common interests of
the Ajmy above those of individuals. It cannot be
emphasised too much that every criticism by him of an
officer of high rank made his position with the Army
more difficult. He did not strew his bed with thorns
for fun. Mistaken he may often have been in discuss-
ing tactics or strategy, but to say anything in dispraise
of gallant men — even of their judgment — ^was padnful
to him ; and we may suppose that this was specially
true in the case of Codrington, whose bravery at the
Alma, Inkerman, and elsewhere he had watched and
recorded with admiration.

Russell wrote to Delane on this subject : —

“ The charge against Codrington, if such it could be
called, was not that he did not send up supports, but
that he did not send up supports in some order of
formation. The men broke out of the trenches in a
crowd, becoming more disorderly and confused as they
ran over the broken ground till they arrived at the
parapet of the Redan, where their officers lost them in
the armed mob. Windham sent three times ‘for
supports in formation.’ It is odd enough that
when the appointment was pending of Codrington as
Commander-in-Chief I was talking with the Admiral
at Kinbum about the possible Commander-in-Chief, and
regretting that Codrington had not fulfilled all our
anticipations on 8th September. ‘ Now,’ he said, * would
you if you had it in your ^wer give him another
chance?' My answer was, ‘Decidedly.’ At the same
time we discussed Windham’s speciality, and I said,' He
would make a capital Chief of the Staff.’ I little thought
at the time that they were so near those posts, but
you will do me the justice to say that it is more than a
year since in my private letters to you I pointed out
Codrington as a rising man when he was unknown to
the bulk of the Army, much more to the people at
home; Windham will make a first-rate Chief of
Staff,, but it is felt that with Lord Panmure’s orders
and ignorant interference from home the post of

COLIN CAMPBELL

239

1855]

Commander-in-Chief in any intelligent and inde-
pendent acts out here will be surrounded with
difficulty and hindrance. One order he sent out w'as
that ‘the men of the working parties should be
stripped and put beneath blankets on their return.’ ”

A trifling sequel may be added to the incident of
Codrington and Russell Later, in London, Russell
imagined that Codrington harboured resentment
against him, and had in fact cut him. He mentioned
this in a letter to Windham. Windham, who knew
well the character of Codrington, answered : —

“You are quite wrong about Codrington cutting
yoiL He is very short-sighted, and if another time
you will come a little closer to him, I’ll bet you a
pound he doesn’t cut you.’’

Whether Russell took the bet or not is not related,
but subsequent entries in his diary as to conversations
with Codrington prove that if he did Windham was
the winner.

Russell writes in “ The Great War with Russia ”
that when Sir W illiam Codrington was appointed to
succeed Sir James Simpson, Sir Colin Campbell
“ blazed with anger, and his anger was something to
see. His face became terrible, and his frame quivered
as he spoke of his supersession by his junior."
Although Colin Campbell left the Crimea a dis-
appointed man, his opportunity, as all the world
knows, came very quickly in India, where he took the
command at the earnest request of the Queen herself,
and where he won a peerage and a baton.* Russell

* When Lord Clyde was made a Field Marshal after the
Mutiny, Russell called on him in the Albany to congratulate him,
and found him exceedingly glum, dressed in bis old tartan jacket
and trews. “ My God, sir,” said the new Field Marshal in response
to Russell’s congratulations, “ it’s all too late. What's the use of
the baton to me now ? There’s scarcely a soul alive that 1 would
care to show it to. Thank yon, thank yon. It is too late.” Lord

240 THE REDAN AND AFTER [Chap. XX.

has recorded in the same book that Colin Campbell
was the only British officer who was on intimate
terms with the French commanders in the Crimea.
He was a close friend of Vinoy, to whom he left ;^5oo
in his will. Russell was mistaken, however, in sajdng
that Colin Campbell’s exceptional feelings towards the
French dated from the time when he was taken
prisoner in the Peninsular War, and was kept for
some time in France, where he was most kindly
treated by Vinoy and others. He was wounded twice
in the Peninsula, but was never a prisoner in
France or elsewhere. He had, in Shadwell’s words,
“invariably entertained a chivalrous respect for the
military qualities of the opponents of his youth,” and
it was in the Crimea that he and Vinoy first met.

On the morning of September 9th, 1855, Sebastopol
was in flames ; the Russians had recognised the truth
that the Malakoff was the key to their position. They
destroyed as much as they could of the town and of
their fleet, and the Allies entered into the place
which had been the cause and the witness of some of
the most terrible sufferings ever undergone by a
British Army. Russell fretted at the composure and
the deliberation with which the Russians were allowed
to make good their retreat, and when they took up a
new position on the north side he exclaimed that the
thunder of their guns was a sound which ought to
have ceased in that region for ever.

Inside Sebastopol he was moved to an overwhelm-
ing pity by the scenes in the hospitals, where he found

Clyde need often in the later years of Ms life to -tell Russell that he
would find that he had not been forgotten “ for tiie good work ” he
did in the Crimea. When he died, General 'Eyre, who inherited
the bulk of Ms fortune, sent to Rnss^ an ivory-handled paper knife
inscribed, “ Souvenir of Lord Clyde,”

INSIDE SEBASTOPOL

241

1855J

many brave Russians left in the extremity of pain, dirt,
and discomfort. He wrote to Delane : —

“ Inside Sebastopol,

'' September ijth, 1855.

“ My Dear Sir, — I took down some paper to the town
to-day, and this is written inside the rums of the city.
Ruins, indeed ! Had we raised the siege on the 8th of
September, Sebastopol would have been destroyed all
except the docks and shipping. Everyone who sees
the place is struck with admiration for the stoicism of
the well-drilled barbarians who defended it. There is
not one square inch of the city in which they could
have been safe from our fire. Such a mass of shells,
splinters, shot-torn timbers, ruined houses! Had an
earthquake shaken every house down, and then a
volcano burnt out the debris, the work could not have
been more completely done.

“The Duke of Newcastle sent me word yesterday
that I ought to visit the hospital. I had been there
before. It was a charnel-house — a sight enough to
drive one mad — z. stench, a scene of horrors which
sickened me. Here is a good sketch for the Illustrated
London News, only it makes the place too light and
lofty, and there are not enough of dead, nor is there
any idea of the packing of the dead and wounded
together. ... I send you some laburnum seeds from
the garden round the church of St Peter and St. Paul,
and a bit of stone from the Governor’s house ; item, a
bit from the dockyard wall as a specimen. No one
knows what’s next to be done.

“ Yours most sincerely always,

“W. H. Russell."

In October, Russell accompanied the naval expedi-
tion which went to Odessa, anchored for a short time
off that beautiful city in two minds whether to lay it in
ruins, and subsequently moved further on to Kinbum,
which was bombarded and captured. Russell was
impressed by the dramatic gestures with which
General Kokonovitch surrendered his fortress. He
appeared with a sword and a pistol in one hand and a

R

R. — vor~ I.

242 THE REDAN AND AFTER [Chap. XX.

pistol in the other ; he threw down the sword at the
feet of the victors and fired the pistols into the ground,
and then turning to the place which had been his
charge arid care, he addressed it in tragic words of
■valediction with tears in his eyes.

After his return to the Army Russell wrote to
Dekne (November 30th, 1855) : —

“ I’m on excellent terms with Windham, and this
moment have received an invitation from him to dinner
on Thursday next, which I have accepted. I intend to
leave (D.V.), for England on Saturday. We are up to
the knees in mud — transport animals dying by scores
in every ditch. The smallest mistakes in the Thun-
derer are made much of out here, I can assure you.
Astley made a good-humoured attack on me at the
race dinner respecting my going on ‘ urgent private
affairs ’ — the ‘ Gods ’ are rather sore on that point after
my remarks* — and there were 109 to i against me. I had
little chance of making an impression in my reply.
But I believe I did some good. All the officers, as far
as I know, are on good terms with me, though Tm
quite aware there is many a fellow who meets me
with a smile and outstretched hand who hates me and
uses his voice to ‘utter foul speeches and detract’ . . .

“ There is an immense soreness of feeling between
our Allies and ourselves ; and I own I fear a rupture
some day or other which may lead to ill blood or to the
spilling of it. ‘ No bono Francis,’ ‘ No bono Inglis,’ is
now too often heard, and there is constant scuffling on
the roads when convoys intersect each other. ... It
was only yesterday 1 prevented two Zouaves getting
roughly handled by some guardsmen. The Frenchmen
were screwed, making grimaces and shouting out ‘ No

• Although Russell in Ms letters frequently condemned the habit
in officers of going home on “ urgent private aifeirs,” he always did
them the justice to say that when they escaped from the plateau
before Sebastopol to the moors, or the coverts at home, they fled
from the tedium and not from the fighting. His point was, that a
higher conception of their duty would make them recognise that the
success of the Army depended quite as much on ■tte intelligent
performance of the household duties, as it were, of a resting' camp
as on gallant leadersMp in tiie infrequent battles.

BRITISH AND FRENCH

243

1855]

bono Inglis ’ dose to the Guards’ camp, and I found
the cause of this rage was that they had been prevented
passing through the Guards’ camp, and were obliged
to come round the enclosure knee deep in mud. I
explained to them that the English were not allowed to
cross through the French camps, and that they must not
expect to have privileges which they denied to others.
The day before, a sentry deliberately raised his piece
and pulled the trigger on Astley, %vho was shooting
down on the Tchemaya 200 yds. from him, but
fortunately the cap missed. Yesterd^ one of the
Commissariat sergeants was coming up from Balaclava
with two ducks on his shoulders; a Frenchman
snatched them away, and when he turned to seize them
the Frenchman dropped on his knee and levelled at
him full cock. And when the sergeant turned for
assistance he bolted across the plains with his booty
and escaped. I might go on with these stories for
ever. But they are not to be spoken of.

“ Your patience must be exhausted, and I have now
only to tell you that I had neither hand, act, or part in
the publication of my portraits,* and that the moment
I heard of them I at once wrote to my wife and to Mr.
Willans to excess my regret and dissatisfaction at the
proceeding. The idea that I sanctioned them annoys
me exceedingly.”

On December 4th, Russell wrote to his wife : —

“ Right or wrong. I’ll leave camp as soon as Hardmant
arrives. I say ‘ right or wrong ’ for many reasons
which men can see, but which women perhaps cannot
be expected to appreciate. Just for example, suppose
this : The Times now think me invaluable ; I cost them
a great deal, the fame of their correspondence is good
— a new man, quite as good a writer as myself, takes
my place ; they find he answers admirably and that it
is the occasion makes the writer, and I, who am
becoming too big for them, am shelved. Again, I get
the name of being a ‘ runaway ’ because I fear another
writer, and I can never write a word against the
oflScers who flock home on 'urgent private affairs.'

* In an English illastia.ted paper.

+ Russell’s substitute.

E 2

244 the red aim and after [Chap. XX.

Affain, I have many friends whose acquaintance I could
cultivate during the daik social evenings of winter but

whose society is impossible during the active opera-
tions. Again, I run a great expense. Again, zeie must
biparfedoncemm. Th at is the great reason of all.

If I start on Thursday, 33 th, that will just land me home

on Chnstmas day. I can scarcely believe it — it’s like
a dream.”

Before leaving the Crimea, for his holiday at home,
Russell received a letter f rom Messrs. Routledge about
the reprint of his letters:—

“We are in receipt of your favour of the 3rd
November. I am glad that you agree with our policy
of publishing the 2nd Wolnme distinct, and not adding
^ the ist. We have been for the ‘copy ’ sent to the
Ixrms since lord_ Raglan’s death but have not as yet
been able to obtain it Immediately we do so, we will
forward it. ^y original matter you may insert will,
of course, add value to the work.

“ With respect to the proposal of a ‘History of the
War, we always imagimed it was your intention to do
one, and shall be most happy to enter into immediate
arrangements with yon for it— quite independent of
the reprint from the Times. The form we should
suggest would be Demy Octavo like Dickens’s works
to appear in shilling monthly parts, with illustrations
either from photographs or from artists who have
been there. _ Eut th is yon can decide ; we merely suggest
what we think would be tie most popular form, and
for remuneration we should propose that you should
receive a certain sum pe rcepy. this in all cases when
a large sale is expected is the best for the author, it
being a property so long as the book sells; and we
may add that no effort slall be wanting on our part to
assist It in every possi ble way. ... I trust that for
many years we may have a good round sum to pay you.”

CHAPTER XXI

RUSSELL’S ACHIEVEMENT

Russell’s short stay in England was just the
luxury" he had dreamed of amid the hardships of the
plateau. It was compact of dinners and theatres and
the doubtful relaxation of long evenings spent in
conversation ; he was now a famous man ; he was
“ Balaclava Russell,” and he had to submit to the
customary treatment of lions. He had only to ask
for a box at the theatre and the answer came prompt
from Charles Kean : —

“ Be assured I shall be too happy to place any
accorrimodation my theatre can afford at your disposal
any night (or every night) you can pay me a visit. If
you will only let me know w^hat evening you are at
liberty for the purpose, I shall be delighted to forward
a Box card._ It is but a small return for the many hours
of gratification and interest I have derived from reading
your admirable letters from the Crimea I only wish
it were in my power to afford a better proof of my high
appreciation of your great talents.”

The only thing w’hich reminded Russell that there
was a more austere world than that in which he was
browsing for a brief space was the necessity of
explaining his accounts to the Manager of the Times.
He was never good at accounts. He probably had
not spent over-much in his simple Crimean life, and
if he had spent more it would have been well wmrth
while for the Times to bear the expense; but still,

246 RUSSELL’S ACHIEVEMENT [Chap. XXL

what irked him was being required to present a
comprehensible balance sheet. He struggled with
it earnestly, but both he and Mowbray Morris had
to confess that they had at last reached a stalemate.
The result was a letter from Morris, in which he
said (January, 1856): —

“I think the best way of settling our accounts is
,to make what tradesmen call a ‘clean slate’ and to
"start afresh. Let it be understood, then, that you and
the paper are quits up to next Saturday. From that
day you will receive a salary of ;^6oo a year payable
monthly by me as long as you remain on my list of
foreign correspondents, this sum being exclusive of
travelling and other expenses incurred while you are
on duty abroad. All I ask on my part is that you will
render monthly accounts of your expenditure showing
a clean balance, and that we may both know how we
stand. I am sure you will find regularity beneficial
in every way.”

Russell’s return to the Crimea was distasteful to
him, not merely because the main interest had vanished
from a campaign which was visibly hastening towards
its end, but because he had lost so many of his best
friends in the assault of September 8th. The plateau
was peopled with ghosts. He was not required either
to watch or to undergo such hardships as those of the
previous winter, and the troops were well clothed.
Indeed, they had a variety in their wardrobe which
commanded the wonder of the French. Such was the
leniency of this winter that Russell found himself
aggrieved by comparative trifles which would have
been unnoticed the year before. For instance, the
presence of a double-humped Bactrian camel which
sat itself, down in front of his hut-door and reposed
there immovably for several days affected him with
peculiar resentment The legs of people entering the

1856] RETURN TO THE PLATEAU

247

hut were within easy reach of the brute’s prodigious
teeth. He was a good-natured brute, however, and
was never spiteful unless anyone tried to mount him,
when he spat and snapped his jaws.

“ No one was sorrv%” writes Russell, “ when he
heard that the ship of the desert had got under way
owing to the deposit of a piece of live coal and some
matches on his back”

On February 28th, 1856, news of the armistice which
was the forerunner of peace reached the British camp,
and, anxious though he was to escape home, Russell
was prevented from being glad by a certain scrupulous
jealousy for the reputation of the British Army. The
next day he met Colonel Windham near Headquarters.
“ You have heard the news, of course ? ” “ Yes,” said
Russell, “and I am very sorry to hear it” “Are you,
indeed ! Well, I am not. You gentlemen of the Press
think it is fine fun to be out here writing about battles
and fights for your papers at home, but we have had
quite enough of it. ” Russell was very angry — probably
the only time he felt angry with Windham. “ I don’t
know, sir,” said he, “ what pleasure you think I can
find out here! I have neither promotion, honour,
rank, nor pay to expect, as you have, sir. I am
astonished that any soldier can rejoice at the idea
of peace before he has wiped the dust of the Redan
off his jacket.” Windham pointed to the large Russian
encampment on the ridges and in the valleys which
could be seen from the CoL “ Look there,” he said,
“ and tell me what you think we could do ! Do you
know that Muravieff is in command there with 100,000
men, in addition to the 70,000 men on the other side ?
There is not a more gallant fellow on earth than
Coddy ; but, by Jove I if he were to move into those

248 RUSSELL’S ACHIEVEMENT [Chap. XXI

ravines and defiles Muravieff would double him up
in an hour.”

It is unnecessary to estimate the degree of provoca-
tion on 'either side in this singular conversation, but
at all events Windham’s assumption that war corre-
spondents find their work fine fun is exceeded in
unreality only by the common assumption that news-
papers thrive on war and that proprietors consequentl3'
welcome it. War exacts an enormous outlay by every
enterprising newspaper, and experience has never
shown that the circulation in any way compensates for
it. On the contrary, since a time of war is generally
also a time of commercial depression, the newspaper
supports an exceptional expenditure at the very time
when it can least afford it.

On March 13th Russell wrote to his wife: —

“ I have been reading such a delicious play — a French
comedy — in which there is a wife and a husband some-
thing like ourselves, but very unlike in other points,
for he is sensible and noble, and she is flighty and
vain. But there are things so good in it that on one
of these quiet evenings which I am looking forward
to I trust to read it to you and take your opinion
about it. The recollection of it here is suggested to
me by reflections on my present condition. I find
myself, after two years’ hard work, free from debt,
but with only a dependency on the Times. The
managers fully think me most lavish and extravagant,
and three-fourths of my gains from the book are gone
altogether. ... A remark in the play frightened the
life out of me — two shillings and ninepence a day is
the interest on £1,^30. So the money I spend on
cabs, etc., per diem is more than all the money I have
is worth. . . . ^ches are not happiness indeed, but
there is great difficulty in living happy without them —
well, that’s very good philosophy.”

As an illustration of the manner in which Russell
was looked to as the friend and guardian of the Army,

THE SOLDIER’S FRIEND

249

1856]

this letter from a private who judged himself ill-used
may be cited : —

“Stockport,

“ 5^/? March 56.

“ Honorable Sir, — I Thomas Miough private soldier
of the 88th Regiment of foot No, 3203, No 3 Company.
Most Humbly begs leave to let your Honr know that
he Wounded in the Queries at Sebastopol on the Night
of the 28th of July last. Was in the Regimental Hospital
till the 2nd of August receiving my pay in full, then
was changed to balliclaver Castle Hospital there my
left arm w^as cut off. Sent several accounts to my
coloured Sergant up to Sebastopol to come and settle
my accounts and instead of coming he sent Word that
I was Dead. Secondly I wrote to him and Sent word
by a man that I was not Dead. Honorable Sir I was
liable to get per day during my time in Hospital
being 78 days and also liable to 28 days pay for field
pay as all Inviluded got. Honorable Sir I Most
Humbly crave your Honorable Enterference in my
pitiful Case as I have no other friend under heaven for
to crave and by compliance your Honorable Addressant
will incessantly pray etc. etc. If Captain Mennurd
Knew about the Sergant’s doings he would se me
justified. Direct to the Pensinors Commanding Office
in Stockport. I have got one Shilling per day during
life

“ God Save the Queen.”

On April 2nd, 1856, the proclamation of Peace was
received with salutes of loi guns from the British,
French, and Sardinian batteries, and from the allied
fleets. For two months more Russell waited on the
plateau, making excursions to Sebastopol in its ruins
and to other places in the neighbourhood, and attend-
ing dinners, reviews, and race-meetings, where
Russian, French and British officers were imited.

On June i8th he wrote to his wife : —

“I’ll send one of the Turkish ponies — Piggy in
preference — home to you, and I’ll sell the rest to kind

250 RUSSELL’S ACHIEVEMENT [Chap. XXI.

masters, or if not turn them adrift. The Huskies are,
however, kind to their animals, and are really veiy
amiable in many respects ; but they are fanatical in all
that concerns their religion. I wish we were a little
more in that way. They are kindly, well disposed,
clever, and warmly attached to friends and country,
and their imper classes are most elegant and accom-
plished. In many respects they more resemble us
than any people in the world, and I think we ought
never to have been enemies.”

Russell must have been one of the very few men
who at that time discerned through the thick atmo-
sphere of distrust the affinities between the British
and Russian peoples, and who anticipated the com-
mon belief of to-day that in the Crimean War
the British Government “put its money on the
wrong horse.” He also perceived the enduring
power of that giant of loosely-knitted limbs who,
Antaeus-like, seems to gain new strength with each
fall; and through his life he never ceased to argue
that in spite of all the opposition of Russian and
British interests, in spite of the alleged peril on the
Indian frontier, Russia was better as a friend than as
an enemy.

On July I2th the main British guard was relieved at
Balaclava by the Russians, and Russell succeeded
with difficulty in obtaining a passage on board a
transport to Constantinople, and so returned to
London.

His achievement in the Crimea was a double one
He not only informed Englishmen of the true con-
dition of their Army in the awful winter of 1854 — 5,
imhesitatingly cutting from under his feet the only
possible ground — deference to authority — on which he
could claim toleration and personal comfort, but he
celebrated in many moving passages the heroism of

1854-6] love of the army 251

the troops. It was the fashion among people who
imperfectly understood his motives to pretend that he
took a perverse pleasure in abusing the Army. Nothing
could have been more unlike Russell’s habit than to do
that From his infancy he had been attached to the
Army; all his dreams of pure heroism took shape
under military forms. The very sight of a uniform
was a sensuous pleasure to his eye, and he said again
and again throughout his life that there was nothing
he would so much have liked to be as a soldier. The
pages in his writings, in which he praises the bravery
and endurance of soldiers, are numerous, and no
impartial reader could miss the high feeling with
which they are written.

In “The British Expedition to the Crimea,” for
example, he said : —

“ It was right that England should be made aware
of the privations which her soldiers endured in this
great winter campaign, that she might reward with
her greenest laurels those gallant hearts, who deserved
the highest honour — that honour which in ancient
Rome was esteemed the highest that a soldier could
gain — that in desperate circumstances he had not
despaired of the Republic. And no man despaired.
The exhausted soldier, before he sank to rest, sighed
that he could not share the sure triumph — the certain
glories — of the day when our flag was to float from
Sebastopol! There was no doubt — no despondency.
No one for an instant felt diffident of ultimate success.
From his remains in that cold Crimean soil, the British
soldier knew an avenger and a conqueror would arise.
If high courage, unflinching bravery — if steady charge
— the bayonet-thrust in the breach — the strong arm in
the fight — if calm confidence, contempt of death, and
love of coimtry could have won Sebastopol, it had long
been ours. Let England know her children as the
descendants of the starved rabble who fought at Agm-
court and Crecy ; and let her know, too, that in fighting

2S2 RUSSELL'S ACHIEVEMENT [Chap. XXI.

against a stubborn enemy, Ler armies had to maintain
a struggle with foes still more terrible, and that, as
they triumphed over the one, so they vanquished the
other.”

But for Russell it would have been supposed that
the French had captured Sebastopol with little more
than occasional help from the British, who joined in as
a belated and discredited reserve. It is our national
habit — ^which it is to be hoped will be counted to us
for righteousness — closely to criticise and disparage
our own performances ; it is the tradition of British
commanders to record their successes in the fewest
possible words, and to avoid even in these few
words emotional language or decorative epithets. The
French, on the contrary, are accustomed to estimate
their performances accurately at what they believe to
be their value. The disparity between the achieve-
ments of the French Army and of the British Army,
as they were reported in the despatches of the respec-
tive commanders-in-chief, was striking enough to be
humiliating to English readers. In particular the
resounding triumph of the Malakoff was popularly
compared with the failure of the Redan till the British
Army was indeed in danger of appearing utterly
inefficient and foolish. Russell’s letters were the
corrective to this view of the Army as following in the
wake of another Army which had greater enterprise
and superior tactical skill.

Here we may quote from a letter to Russell, in
which Sir John Adye, long afterwards, reflected on
the singular practice of claiming for the French praise
for movements which they did not happen to execute.
Sir John Adye had been asked by Russell for his
opinion on a particular passage in Todleben's

i8s4-6] the BRITISH DISPARAGED 253

account of the Battle of the Alma in “ The Defence
of Sebastopol ” : —

“ I do think it is hard that the French and Russians
should both say^ that the French artillery helped us to
storm the position in our front, when they did nothing
of the sort. Todleben merely copies the French
account Now, I was on the spot with Turner’s guns
on the knoll, and I saw the light division attack the
great batterj-, and I afterwards rode with Lord I^glan
up the hill with the Guards, and I am certain that no
French artillery w^as in action at that time assisting us.
On the contrarj', as I was approaching the top of the
hill, Lord Raglan, observing several of our English
batteries coming up on the right of our troops, told me
to get them into action, and to make it hot for the
retreating Russians. I saw no French artillery.
Besides, they were too far off to help us ; and what is
more, I asked Sir Hugh Rose if the French helped us
as stated, and he says they did not As he was with
SL Amaud at the time, he is the best authority. So it
the question comes, pray do justice to the English
Army. God knows there were plenty of points in
which, as regards administration, the English Govern-
ment fell off; but I think that as the soldiers did take
the ground in their front at Alma without assistance,
it is only just they should get the credit.”

Those who knew Russell intimately in the Crimea
were naturally in no danger of misrepresenting his
feelings towards the Army. His friends were not only
numerous but faithful — they remained his friends for
life. Kinglake has described how his personality
attracted a host of willing informants to his quarters : —

“ His opportunity of gathering intelligence depended,
of course, in a great measure, upon communications
which might be made to him by ofiBcers of their own
free will ; and it is evident that to draw full advantage
from occasions formed in that way the inquirer must
be a man so socially gifted, that by his own powers of
conversation he can evoke the conversation of others.
Russell was all that and more: be was an Irish

254 RUSSELL’S ACHIEVEMENT [Chap. XXL

humourist, whose very tones fetched a laugh. If he
only shouted ‘Virgilio’ — ^Virgilio was one of his
servants — the sound when heard through the canvas
used often to send divine mirth into more than one
neighbouring tent ; and whenever, in solemn accents,
he owned the dread uniform he wore to be that of the
late ‘ disembodied Militia,’ one used to think nothing
more comic could ever be found in creation than his
rendering of a ‘ live Irish ghost’ In those days when
the Army was moving after having disembarked at the
Old Fort, he had not found means to reorganise the
needed campaigning arrangements which his voyage
from Bulgaria had disturbed, and any small tribulation
he suffered in consequence used always to form the
subject of his humorously plaintive laments. He
always found, sooner or later, some blank leaves out
of a pocket-book and some stump of a pencil with
which to write his letters — ^letters destined in the sheets
of the Times to move the hearts and souls of our people
at home and make them hang on his words ; but until
he could lay hands on some writing materials, there
was ineffable drollery in his way of asking some
sympathy for ' a poor devil of a Times correspondent
without pens, ink, or paper.’ By the natural display
of a humour thus genial and taking he thawed a great
deal of reserve, and men talked to him with much
more openness than they would have been likely to
show if approached by a solemn inquirer in evident
search of d^ facts. Russell also had abundant sagacity,
and besides, in his special calling was highly skilled, for
what men told him he would seize with rare accimacy,
and could convert at once into a powerful narrative.”

Kinglake, while admitting that Russell “ was not at
all one of those who by temper or temperament are
predisposed to be censors,” and that his subsequent
career as a war correspondent “ showed him to be a
loyal conformist, who under fitting arrangements could
-effectively serve his employers without betraying the
interests of the belligerents who might make him their
guest,” attributes to him errors of judgment in sending
home “ throughout the dire period of winter, by every

1854 - 6 ] “ PERILOUS DISCLOSURES ”

255

mail, vivid accounts of the evils that obstructed supply,
and of the hardships, the sickness, the mortality afflicting
and destroying our troops.” These vivid accounts, in
Kinglake’s judgment, were “perilous disclosures.”

If they were perilous disclosures, they must have
been perilous either because they affected directly the
moral of the British Army, or because they gave
information or — which is as bad — brought a renewal
of confidence to the enemy. Enough has been said to
prove that the first alternative is untrue; the effect of
Russell’s letters was a shower of sympathy and
comforts from home which notably raised the spirits
of the Army. As for the second, it has already been
admitted that Russell, in a moment of inopportune
optimism, when he supposed that the British Army
would advance to new ground within a few days,
revealed the position of a powder magazine. More
will be said later, in a discussion of the functions of
war correspondents, about the risk of their giving
valuable information to the enemy. It is an obvious
and real risk, and yet it has probably been exaggerated
It is a difficult matter to investigate, as satisfactory
evidence can come only from the enemy, and that is a
tainted source. There is no discoverable instance,
however, in which the Russians ever made use to
their own advantage of facts learned from Russell’s
letters. Years after the Crimean War, when there was
no longer any pressing reason for a Russian to be
otherwise than candid in speaking to an Englishman,
Russell wrote to Gortchakoff and asked him plainly
his opinion. Did the letters to the Times help the
Russians ? Gortchakoff answered : —

“ Your admirable letters were as agreeable as they
were well written; my cousin used to send me the

256 RUSSELL’S ACHIEVEMENT [Chap. XXI.

papers from Warsaw, and I read them regularly, but
1 am bound to admit that I never received any informa-
tion from them, or learned anything that 1 had not
known beforehand.”

We may turn from this negative testimony to a
positive and glowing assertion of Russell’s services.
Sir Evelyn Wood, in a letter to Russell in 1894 about
an article written for the Fortnightly Review, said : —

“ In my article I am chastising you with scorpions,
but still you will mind this the less, that I say, truly
enough, that it was you who saved the remnants of
our Army. See the Fortnightly ist of next month;
this will be balm indeed, though seriously I always
think that the present generation of soldiers has no
idea of what you did for their fore-elders in saving the
remnant of those who were allowed to starve or next
door to it.”

In another letter Sir Evelyn Wood said : —

“ My Dear .Eriend, — I endorse thoroughly what
your critic said of your having saved our Army, but
should interpolate before the word ‘ Army ’ the words
‘what was left of.’ However, in my view you did
much more — ^you saved armies of the future by showing
up our incompetence for war. Of course no man ever
made so many bitter enemies — ^we were all incom-
petent ; but the recollection of many men who love
the Army more than individuals must often turn with
appreciation to your work in the Crimea.

“ Your old friend,

“Evelyn Wood.”

In the article in Fortnightly Review entitled “The
Crimea in 1854 and 1894,” Sir Evelyn Wood said : —

“We are now about to pay for what was hastily
termed ‘ procrastination ’ in our leaders, and ‘ indo-
lence ’ in our men, but rather from our coimtr3nnen’s
incapacity to understand that even British soldiers
may be severely tried in tasks assigned to them. The
Army may well forgive this erroneous opinion I have

1854-6] SIR E. WOOD’S TESTIMONY

257

quoted, for it was based on imperfect knowledge, and
he who wrote it by telling the story of our men’s
sufferings to the public saved the remnant of our
Army. The Times more than half a century ago, by
rescuing the principal bankers of Europe from pecu-
niary losses, gained greater honours than have ever
before or since been paid to any newspaper. These
services were, however, but trifles compared to what
their agent, the first of War Coijespondents, effected
for pur troops during the painful scenes I shall
describe in a further article. Custom, and an acquired
sentiment of reticence xmder privations, tied the
tongues and pens of our chiefs. William Howard
Russell dared to tell his employers, and through them
all English-speaking peoples, that our little Army was
perishing from want of proper food and clothing. He

g robably made mistakes as his statements, often
urriedly written, were necessarily based on incom-
plete information. He incurred much enmity, but few
unprejudiced rnen who were in the Crimea will now
attempt to call in question the fact that by awakening
the conscience of the British nation to the sufferings
of its troops, he saved the remnant of those grand
battalions we landed in September.”

The final testimony we shall quote to Russell’s
services is a letter written by Admiral Sir Robert
Mends, who had been Flag-Captain to Lord Lyons in
the Agamemnon.

“ Anglesey, Alverstoke,

February i 6 th, 1895.

“ Dear Doctor Russell, — I have just read with
intense interest your ‘ Great War wdth Russia, 1854
and 1855,’ and rejoice to see the maladministration of
the Government of that day so honestly placed before
the world. As Flag-Captain to Lord Lyons through
the whole, and much in his confidence, I could not fail
to be much behind the scenes. I kept no regular diary
because my daily occupations were too numerous, but
I wrote early and late a full account of current events
to my late wife, which accounts for many things being
done or not done. At the close of the war, walking
one day with the late Lord Carnarvon along the shore

S. — VOL. I.

i8s4-<I pride and indignation 2S9

of Universal Exhibitions had ended war for ever, when
the pride of the nation in its Army had a singularly
acute revival, and when Russell ministered to that
sense in words which made his countr 3 ’’men thrill with
emotion and tingle with hot indignation. The letters
gave all the essential facts in the liveliest and easiest
of narratives. Descriptions like his had never before,
and have never since, been produced under such
immediate adversity and under the sting of so much
antagonism on the spot and official condemnation at
home. The after-glow of those days still hangs about
them, and will illuminate and dignify them in the eyes
of everyone who has a rudimentary historical sense
so long as the English tongue exists.

CHAPTER XXII

RUSSELL AS LECTURER

The Crimean War had left its mark on Russell in
many ways ; the physical impressions passed, but the
effects on his character were permanent. But even
the physical impressions were deep. As a person
who comes on shore after a long voyage can scarcely
believe that the ground does not rock beneath his
feet, so Russell could scarcely believe after his return
that he no longer rose up and lay down to the sound
of guns. He has described his first day at home : —

“ I woke from a deep sleep at daylight, shouting,
‘ Tumble out, tumble out, there is a sortie ! ’ rubbed
my eyes as I struggled out of bed and encountered my
wife. ‘What is the matter? What are you dreaming
about? You have startled me terribly.’ ‘It’s most
extraordinary,’ I said apologetically, _ ‘ but I heard
heavy firing not far off, I could swear it.’ ‘You must
get rid of these Crimean memories,’ said she. ‘ The
war, thank Heaven! was over months ago.’ ‘It is
very foolish, I know, but I thought there was a sortie.’
‘ I hope you won’t have a sortie every night, my
dear! ’ I felt rather ashamed of myself As we were
sitting down to breakfast my cousin Abraham Russell,
Rector of a church in Billingsgate, appeared. He
had seen my arrival announced in the paper, and had
hastened to greet me. As he was tapping an egg he
said casually, ‘ The Guards were out this morning in
the Park — a field day or drill, I suppose. I came
through the Park just in time to see them firing away
heavily in squares. The squares were not visible for
smoke.’ There was a triumph for me! ‘Now,
Mrs. Russell,’ I said, with great dignity, ‘will you
believe me again when I tell you I hear musketry ? ’ ”

1856]

PALMERSTON

261

Two days later Russell received a letter from
Delane, enclosing a note from Lord Palmerston. It
was delivered by special messenger and was marked
“ Immediate.”

“I would take it as a kindness,” wrote Lord
Palmerston, ” if you would ask Mr. Russell to give me
the pleasure of his company at 10 o’clock to breakfast
if he is in London. I do not know his address, or I
would not trouble yoa No answer required.”

Russell has left this account of his interview with
Palmerston : —

“ I was at the house in Piccadilly now occupied by
the Naval and Military Club to the moment, and was
shown into a room where there were three or four
gentlemen whom I did not know, and the number
increased by two or three more when Lx)rd Palmerston
bounded rather than walked into the room, with a
genial ‘Good morning.’ He shook hands with those
nearest the door, and then coming straight to me said,
‘ I am glad you were able to come on so short a notice.
Now to breakfast. I did not ask Mr. Delane as I
know he is not an early riser.’ My neighbour on the
right was the Austrian Secretary of Embassy, and on
the left was an Irish member. The conversation at
table was animated, generally started by the host,
and I was rather put at my ease as I was allowed to
listen to the various subjects that were discussed,
with few of which I had an acquaintance. At last the
company began to leave, but it was a slow process, for
Lord Palmerston had a few words for each ere his
guests departed. As I approached to make my bow
and retire. Lord Palmerston said, ‘ Don’t go yet if you
are not very busy. I want a few minutes’ chat
with you.’

“The interview which followed was rather em-
barrassing for me, for Lord Palmerston after a few
remarks about my correspondence from the Crimea,
suddenly asked me, ‘ What would you do if you were
at this moment charged with the command of the
British Army? You have been telling us that the

262 RUSSELL AS LECTURER [Chap. XXIL

French were so much better than we were ; suppose
you were called upon to organise our Army, beginning
with the upper commands m it, what would you do ? ’
I was naturally taken aback, for I never thought that
I should be asked such a question, but I said, ‘ I think
their Staff, the Etat Major, is very good and we have
nothing like it.’ ‘No,’ said Palmerston, ‘that is quite
true, but we have done very well without it. Remem-
ber we are dealing with a British not with a French
Army. The nature of the force of the two differs.
Recollect that the most effectual recruiting sergeant
in these islands is the village constable. We have to
depend on voluntary enlistment to fill our ranks, and
I look upon the praise given to the results of
conscription as stuff and nonsense. I cannot believe
that men who are forced to do work of any kind do it
better than men who take up the work of their own
accord. You will say perhaps that the pressure of
poverty and the fear of the village constable, or game-
keeper, operates as a sort of compulsion, but surely
you will understand what a difference there is
between that sort of pressure and the result of
government enactments which compel the people of a
country to submit to military service whether they
like it or not. No ; all you gentlemen forget that our
Army is the Army of England, and that it is not the
Army of France, and that it never can be, and I hope
never will be, anything but what it is. And you
know it well, for you told us how well our troops in
the Crimea sustained the ancient reputation of our
Annies. I will make no comparisons. And then for
about half-an-hour there followed a series of searching
questions respecting our generals. Occasionally my
host shook his head, sometimes nodded approvingly,
occasionally uttered a word or two of agreement At
last, rising, he said, ‘I am very much interested in
what you have told me, and I hope I shall have the
pleasure of seeing you again soon.’ I went away with
the feeling that I had cut rather a poor figure in the
interview, for Lord Palmerston seemed to know more
about our Army than I did. I regretted ezceedinjgly
that I had not even thought out what I would do if I
were in the place of the Commander-in-Chief, for then

1856]

VISIT TO RUSSIA

263

I might have made some more definite reply to Lord
Palmerston’s questions than I did, when I gave the
feeble answer to his astoimding question.”

After spending only ten days in England Russell
was sent to Russia to report the coronation of the
Czar Alexander II. After the coronation he described
various Russian cities and scenes of Russian life, and
revisited the Crimea, At the end of the year he was
back in England, He resumed the old life more or
less, rather more of the club perhaps than before,
and certainly less of the grinding and less congenial
labours of reporting. He had now every opportunity
of being a social lion if he wished. After a short
experiment he did not wish it ; he made friends with
some great personages, but only because he liked
them ; he did not pursue acquaintances which brought
him no pleasure. Perhaps the most genuine pleasure
which this year brought him was the conferment of
the honorary degree of LL,D. by Trinity College,
Dublin. For the next forty years — till he was
knighted in 1895 — he was knowm everywhere as
“Dr. Russell”

His diaries are packed with reflections on the
sayings and characters of his intimate friends. Thus
he remarks of Albert Smith, with whom he din ed
early in January : —

“Albert Smith in speaking of his father this evening
had eyes filled with tears — for which I much revered
him. He spoke of the old man’s fon^ess for his
lathe, and his little quiet amusements, with real
affection. It is a sad but true remark that men who
are not what is called convivial are men of strong
family feelings Generally those who are convivid
are cosmopolitan and vag^e in their love and
affections.”

2&4 KUbbi-LL AS LECTURER [Chap. XXII.

Thackeray, he records, dined with him one night
and argued to Mrs. Russell that her husband was all
the better for “ staying out at night.” Thackeray also
told her on this occasion that he himself had been
called a “ hoary-headed infidel buffoon ” by a country
paper, and “ he seemed rather angry.”

About the same time we find Russell dining with
Delane, and the Diary tells us that Delane, talking of
war, quoted a saying “out of Herodotus, or Thucy-
dides, that certain warlike machines would be not
only the destruction of brave men, but the grave of
courage.” How often, one wonders, has that pre-
diction been made, and how often have men shown
as much ingenuity in escaping death as the inventors
have shown in plotting it ? Or how often, again, has
it been discovered by a heavily tried man that death
is after all but death, and that, having accepted it as
a fact, it matters to him only in a minute degree
whether he be killed by a flint axe or a Maxim gun ?
Delane enlarged upon the contrast between the
episodes in the life of Louis Philippe. On a certain
day in 1847 he reviewed 60,000 men in France, and on
the same day the next year in London he was driving
in a hackney cab to Coutts's Bank to get ;^ioo. This
very dinner was the beginning of an important matter
for Russell. But he has described it in his own
words ; —

“Dining with Delane on the loth of January with
Bob Lowe, Dasent,* etc., Lowe, a^opos of Thackeray,
said, ' I cannot think why RusseU should not lecture
on the war and make a fortune, as he did.’ *Nor I
indeed,’ said Delane ; whilst Dasent exclaimed, ‘ Put
your pride in your pocket and get your money.’ Ere

* Afterwards Sir George Dasent, Delane’s brother-in-law.

iS57] PREPARING THE LECTURES

265

a month I was under engagements to commence a
course of lectures, the first of which was to be given
in London, at prices which appeared to me exceedingly
high. But Mr. Beale, my agent, knew his London,
and he was quite content to undertake the preliminary
advertisements and expenditure on terms which
appeared to me very liberal indeed, for he assigned to
me in the first place either two-thirds of the receipts,
he taking one-third and paying all expenses, or ^50
and half of the profits, the expenses to be deducted
from the receipts and then the surplus to be divided.
I was to begin the course in Easter week. There
were to be plans of the battlefields by Grieve and
Telbin. Thackeray, Douglas Jerrold, Harrison
Ainsworth, Sam \\ ard, Captain Willans and others
formed a kind of council to advise and assist As
time went on I was working for the Times, preparing
my second volume for Routledge, and dealing with
a heavj’ course of dinners, as well as getting my
lectures into order. I had two months before me,
which I thought would be enough. At the end of
March, the prospectus of the lectures was out and I
was brought face to face with the fact that I hated
lecturing, and it was only from the encouragement
and persistence of Thackeray, that I mustered up
courage to stand to my guns. ‘You will make 1,500
less than I expected,’ he said, ‘ in consequence of the
elections, but it can’t be helped. I made only a
hundred a week myself in Scotland.’ "

To all Russell’s other distractions in London — once
when he fled for a few days to Tunbridge Wells
Mrs. Russell told his friends that he had gone because
he was unable to refuse invitations to dinner — a
new worry was suddenly added. Delane wrote to
him that he wished him to go to China. After
receiving this “ terrible letter,” as he calls it in his
diary, Russell drove at once to the Times office and
saw Delane, who figured as a very diplomatic editor,
holding out “prospects of failure in the lectures,
and again great success in Chinese picturea” This

266 RUSSELL AS LECTURER [Chap. XXII.

suspense was ended in a few days, however, by
Russell’s doctor, who absolutely refused to allow him
to go.

One day in April Russell attended a public dinner
at which Lord George Lennox brought into his
speech, “ a very handsome allusion ” to him, saying
that in his belief Russell had saved the Army.

“This,” remarks Russell in his diary, “from one
of the house of Richmond, an old soldier, an old
Duke’s man, an old Peninsular, was gratifying and
unexpected.”

in preparing his lectures Russell took the pre-
caution of consulting Delane, who wrote : —

"May gtky 1857.

“My Dear Russell,— I have gone honestly and
carefully through all the lecture vou have sent me,
and have struck out a little and added a word or two
here and there. I think it will do, and do well, and
I should not feel at all nervous in delivering it. But
you must go carefully over it again, so that all you
intend to deliver shall be plain reading. Unless it is,
you will never feel confidence. I think you are wise
m being civil to Airey and the rest of them. It would
never do to create a hostile feeling in the mind
military, and I would therefore steer as clear as
possible of censure, except upon the home Govern-
ment. That is always fair game ; and the man who
will resent to the death the imputation that the man
the Government has chosen is not that very rare
animal, a general, will have no hesitation in accusing
the Government itself of treachery and every other
vice. I shall be very anxious for your success, but
I feel no manner of doubt of it if you will keep quiet
in the meantime and harden your heart when the
moment comes.

“ Ever yours,

“J. T. D."

"Vmit summa dies," says the autobiography. “I
will never forget the opemng day. At a test lecture

STAGE FRIGHT

267

1857]

attended by all my friends, I had done pretty well, but
when the 23rd May came, and I found myself in
Willis’s Rooms, and, looking through a hole in the
curtain, beheld row after row of familiar faces —
De Lacy Evans, Airey, and a whole host of staff
and regimental officers, I Avas seized with a mortal
sinking, and insisted that I could not go upon the
stage. My tongue clove to the roof of my mouth.
Whilst I was reasoning thus, Thackeray, treacherously
falling upon me, pushed me out upon the platform.
I would have fled if my legs would have obeyed me.

“Another rehearsal four days later at the Gallery
of Illustration in Regent Street, with Dickens, Jerrold,
and others sitting in judgment, taught me more con-
fidence for the second lecture, which was delivered
on the 28th. And on Whit Sunday I gave a diimer
at Greenwich, whereat I received the congratulations
of my friends, and was assured that I would make
a pot of money. Delane, MacDonald, Morris, Oxen-
ford, represented the Times. Dickens, Thackeray,
Jerrold, Shirley Brooks, O’Hagan, and others repre-
sented general society. The banquet, charged with
so much good fellowship and kindness, was worth
the £so w'hich I deducted from the receipts at Willis’s
Rooms.’’

In a letter making an appointment to hear Russell
go through certain passages of his lecture in yet
another rehearsal, and at the same time declining an
invitation to dine at Russell’s house, Dickens wrote : —

“Tavistock House,

“Saturday, May 30/ft, 1857.

“ My Dear Sir, — A s we do not move the caravan
until Monday I received your note at dinner just now
(7 o’clock).

“ Mrs. Dickens would be glad to kill the Dragon —
as glad, let us say as Miss Saint George — and would
triumph in the act, but that she has unfortunately
some sisterly, motherly, paternal, or other family
engagements for to-morrow. She is very anxious
that I should explain her aright to Mrs. Russell
through you — and you see how distinctly I do it !

268 RUSSELL AS LECTURER [Chap. XXIL

“It is to-morrow, Sunday, at 12.30 that you expect
me at the Gallery, is it not ? Unless you reply in
the negative I intend to be there. I_ should have no
doubt on the point but for your having written from
the Gallery this afternoon and not precisely saying in
two syllables, Sunday, in your former note.

“ Ever faithfully yours always,

“Charles Dickens.

“W. H. Russell, Esquire.’’

Afterwards Russell lectured in many of the large
towns. He never liked the undertaking, but perhaps
he disliked it less than he had anticipated. To the
whole affair his diary, however, again and again
declares his repugnance; and yet, as he wrote, he
had “ to get on or be for ever diddled pecuniarily.”

When he was lecturing at Liverpool he heard of
Douglas Jerrold’s death on June 8th. Much as friend-
ship meant to Russell, Jerrold’s death was such a
blow as he scarcely ever experienced again. Only
a few evenings before, Jerrold had dined with him at
the “ Fifty Pound banquet,” and daily at the Garrick
Russell was accustomed to regard his sparkling con-
versation as an essential part of his life and happiness.
In his diary Russell wrote : —

“Good God! how frightful — Douglas Jerrold is no
more! I felt sick and nervous — could scarce write
or eat A large audience. I was very bad and slow,
and prosy to a degree. The second part went rather
better. When I came home and the excitement was
over I could only think of Douglas Jerrold.”

To his wife he wrote : —

“ My dear, kind, good, and too generous friend — I can
scarcely believe it I No one has given me any details.
Oh, dear Mary, is it not shocking, his poor dear wife
so fond and proud of him, his daughter on whom he
doted. I now recall every word and look of that
devoted friend.”

1857] DICKENS AND JERROLD 269

He wrote to Dickens reproaching himself for not
having noticed that Jerrold was really ill at the
Greenwich dinner. Dickens answ’ered : —

“Office of Household Words,

“ 16, Wellington St. North,

“ IVednesday, tenth June, 1857.

“ My Dear Russell, — Although I can quite under-
stand that a generous nature is quick to give itself
the pain you describe, I am perfectly sure that you
have nothing to reproach yourself wnth in association
with the poor, dear fellow. I do not doubt that he
would have died in the same hour, though he had
not dined with us ; and that he was happy that day
and recalled the air of our ride on his bed but a day
or two before he passed awa3L I know from Lemon,
to whom he spoke of it with great cheerfulness and
pleasure. He was taken very ill on the next day —
the Mondaj’.

“He tried to get up as usual, rolled over on his
bed, and fell into great pain. On the Wednesday
and Thursday they were very alarmed; but on the
Friday he rallied again and was free from pain, though
exceedingly weak.

“ It was then that Lemon saw him for the last time.
He had begun to be confident of getting better, and
he told Lemon about our riding over Blackheath, and
ateut the air having been so fresh and pleasant to
him. On the Saturday he turned worse ; on the
Sunday he was in terrible pain and suffered severely ;
on the Monday morning the pain left him, but he was
gfreatly exhausted, and knew himself to be dying.

“He said that if he had sj>oken at all hardly of
anyone or to anyone he had not meant it, and that
he died at perfect peace. His son William was hold-
ing him in his arms. He went on to mention friends
to whom he desired to be remembered, when he
became indistinct, and in a few moments died.

“ I had heard at Gad’s Hill, in a note from Evans,
that he had been seriously ill, but I supposed him to
be recovering and thought it quite past

“I was coming up by the railway yesterday morning
with my wife and her sister (of wnom he had always

270 RUSSELL AS LECTURER [Chap. XXII.

been fond) when a gentleman in the carriage, looking
over his newspaper, told another ‘Douglas Jerrold is
dead.’ You may imagine how shocked we were.

“ I went up there as soon as we reached town, and
then went to Whitefriars to urge the immediate
necessity of exertion in behalf of the widow and
daughter. I found that Brooks had already acted with
kindness and judiciousness that I can never forget in
hirn, and I suggested a plan for certain benefit nights,
which I hope to be able to mature this afternoon;
I am only waiting while Brooks confers with his son.
Arthur Smith, invaluable where promptitude and
sagacity are wanting, wrote to me this morning, like
a good, sound fellow, saying his aid is ready, f hope
and_ believe that if nothing arises to prevent our tur ning
to in earnest we may easily — and not beggingly —
raise jfi,soo at least I would have the actors (our
old T. D. Cooke *) play the ‘ Rent Day ’ and ‘ Black
Eye’d Susan ’ one night On another night I would
read, or do anything. On another night you could
lecture to a good, large, liberal, comprehensive, public
audience.

“All this series I would announce as a tribute of
his friends to his memory — or in some such way —
so that it should not be a pitiful appeal. You shall
hear more as soon as I know more. Poor, dear
fellow! I went up to him before I left Greenwich
that Sunday night, and asked Lim how he was. He
said much better, much the better for coming — ^had
only taken a little weak brandy and water to drink,
and enjoyed it, and some curried fish. I said he was
all right now, and he said, ‘Oh yes, my dear boy —
all right now — ^that faint, you know — nothing more,’
and we shook hands heartily and parted. I cannot
believe it now, or that we three were laughing
together in that sunshine and summer wind with
schemes and plans before us. Last autumn at
Boulogne, day after day while poor A’Beckett lay ill,
he used to come up to me with his report and walk
about the garden talking about these sudden strikings
down of the men we loved in the midst of us. When

♦ Probably T. P. Cooke, who played ‘William in Jerrold’s “ Black
Eye’d &san."

1857 ]

DICKENS’S DREAM

2/1

he sent to Lemon a little notice of A’Beckett after
his death, for Punch, he wrote in the envelope ‘ My
d^r Mark, who among us will be the next, and who
wiU write a word or two of him?*

“ Again, my dear Russell, let me impress upon you
iny perfect conviction that his dining at Greenwich
did not by a hair’sbreadth hasten his death. I am

? uite convinced it had no sort of bearing on it. As
told you when we walked from the Garrick after
him, I had found him at the Gallery of Illustration
very ill — and had been greatly struck by his account
of his illness and by his becoming very sick and white
in Leicester Square.

“I have no doubt that the mortal malady had its
hand upon him at that time, and had it on him during
the whole attack. If he could have been got into the
country, at rest and away from some family troubles,
a month before, I think he might have recovered — if
it is not mere idleness to speculate upon such a possi-
bility when the Almighty had numbered his days.

“ But that his time was come, when we were with
him, I feel assured. When I went home that Sunday
night I could not leave off saying that I was afraid
Jerrold was in a bad way, or recalling his condition in
Leicester Square. On the Monday night of his death
I dreamed that he came and showed me a writing (but
not in his hand), which he was pressingly anxious I
should read for my own information, but I could not
make out a word of it I woke in great perplexity, wdth
its strange character quite fresh m my sight

“ Ever faithfully yours,

“C D.”

To the end of his tour Russell was not at all recon-
ciled to lecturing. It is not quite clear why this very
legitimate way of adding to his income — one, moreover,
that bestowed a benefit upon the public — ^was so dis-
tasteful to him, but it may be conjectured that he
perceived some unseemly contrast between using his
Crimean information in the first place for a lofty
purpose and in the second to put money into his pocket

272 RUSSELL AS LECTURER [Chap. XXII.

He was particularly disgusted at Harrogate, where
money was taken at the doors and there were “wrangles
for change in the room.” The only lecture he had his
heart in was the one he delivered for the benefit of
Jerrold’s family. At the end of the tour he had
earned £i, 6 oo.

On his return to London he received an invitation
from Mr. Walter, the chief proprietor of the Times, to
stay at his house, Bear Wood; and Delane enforced
on him in a note the propriety of accepting it

“Pray comedown with me to BearWood on Saturday
next. You can come up on Monday, and Mr. Waiter-
makes such a point of your going down to him that I
think he will feel hurt if you don’t go. I look on such
invitations as Royal ‘commands,’ and I think you had
better follow an example which has been approved by
long practice.”

Towards the end of November Delane informed
Russell that he wished him to go to India to inquire
into the reports of atrocities. Russell was not at all
inclined to go, as his wife was ill, and he knew that his
absence abroad would make her extremely anxious
and thus lessen her chance of a good recovery. On
thinking the matter over, however, he recognised that
to refuse that kind of journalistic emplo3Tnent of which
he was -virtually the inventor would be to end his
connection with the Times. He remembered that in
the Crimea, Mowbray Morris had iiiformed him plainly
enough that he must regard his obligation to the Times
as being essentially like a soldier’s obligation to the
Army. He therefore decided to go to India, but he
pleaded for a little delay in starting, and wrote with
an indignant note of exclamation in his diary of
November 26th that Delane appeared to expect him to

OFF TO INDIA

2-3

18573

start that very night. After all, circumstances delaj-ed
his departure till after Christmas.

On December 8th he called on Lord Granville,
who had expressed through Delane a desire to see
him. Lord Granville received him very cordialh’,
and spoke in high terms of Lord Canning’s services
in India He insisted particularly that Russell when
he met Canning must not think him stiff and cold.
"Let your acquaintance improve,” he said. "The
better j-ou know him the better you will like him.”
Speaking of the Crimean War, Lord Granville said
that Gortchakoff had told him — what Gortchakoff
told Russell himself in a letter already quoted — that
the Russians had never learned anything of value
from the Times or the other English newspapers.

On December 26th Russell left England. Mrs.
Russell was not well enough to be told that he was
going ; the doctors thought it best that the news should
be broken to her when she was stronger.

“She looked at me with such a mild grief in her
eyes,” Russell wrote in his diarv, "as if suspecting
the truth. I could not bear to be much with her.”

Of his movements later in the day he \\'rote : —

" I sent my things down privately to the brougham.
I found my wife upstairs asleep. I did not disturb
her. The children, under Lizzie’s* care, were playing
very happily. I did not bid them farewell After a
few words with her I stepped out into the street, but
not without Albertat seeing me shake hands with
Lizzie. And then I was alone.”

On the last day of the year Russell found himself in
the Mediterranean, on his way to India He was

* A cousin of Russell’s, who used to take charge of the children
when Mrs. Russell was ill.

t Russell’s second daughter, now Hrs. Longfield.

K. — VOL. L

T

accustomed to write in his diaries at the beginning of
January resolutions for the year, and at the end of the
year reflections on his situation and conduct.

On this occasion he wrote : —

“ The last day of the old year, and here am I afloat
on the ocean of life once more. That ocean is to me
as troublous as the sea which is now around me. The
beacon light from home is obscured and my course is
painful and uncertain. God grant the light may soon
break through the clouds. It is very rough, the wind
high, the sea rising. In this ship there is perhaps no
man more blessed with wife and friends, above all with
children, than myself ; but there is none so little gifted
with the art of pushing his fortune, of using friends, of
making money to store up for the future. And yet I
have much to be thankful for in all truth, and if my
life is spared I will struggle on till the light comes.”

CHAPTER XXIII

THE MUTINY: FIRST IMPRESSIONS

Russell’s mission in India was, as he says, “to
judge of the truth of the accounts of hideous massacres
and outrages which were rousing to fury the people
of England.” He had been deeply impressed by
the reports of these awful scenes, “ compared with
which,” as he says, “ Sulla’s proscriptions, the Sicilian
Vespers, the great auto da fe on Bartholomew’s Eve,
or the Ulster outbreak of 1641, were legitimate acts of
judicial punishment.” He did not doubt the substantial
truth of the reports, “ but,” he adds —

“I wanted proof, and none was forthcoming. All
the stories we heard were from Calcutta, and the
people of Calcutta were far from the districts where,
no doubt, most treacherous and wholesale murder had
been perpetrated.”

Thus he describes in his diary his mental attitude
towards events in India This diary, expanded but
nowhere altered in sense, was published under the title
of “My Diary in India,” by Messrs. Routledge, in i860.
It has been thought right to make a liberal use of it
here in accordance with the scheme for making this
record as far as possible autobiographical. Russell, it
may be said at once, did not dream of disputing such
notorious massacres of Europeans as those at Meerut,
Delhi and Cawnpore, but he was sceptical about the
large accretion, or fringe, of stories of mutilation, out-
rage and torture which filled the Calcutta papers.
When he started for India the early events of the

276

THE MUTINY [Chap. XXIII.

Mutiny were familiar history, and the mutineers were,
as a fact, already deprived of easy opportunities for
exercising their ferocity.

Early in 1857 there had been isolated manifestations
of disaffection among the Bengal native troops, but the
Mutiny* proper began at Meerut on May loth. The
almost inexplicable failure of the British garrison there
(in spite of the previous signs, and Henry Lawrence’s
warnings) to recognise the grave significance of the
outbreak, and to deal with it quickly and resolutely,
could not be repaired after the first few hours of fatal
hesitation. The mutineers marched from Meerut to
Delhi ; their taste for blood had been whetted and was
to be widely and grossly gratified ; and the flame of
revolt flashed through almost the whole of the Bengal
native Army. Soon nearly ninety thousand native
soldiers were in open mutiny, with their hands steeped
in the blood of many of their officers and of English
women and children. And they were a truly formid-
able force. They were a British-trained army ; they
had a great deal of artillery, a great deal of ammimition,
disciplined and well-horsed cavalry, and enough
resources to carry on war for a long time. The
centenary of the battle of Plassey was, indeed, cele-
brated by the ugliest challenge to our power abroad
which had been experienced since the very dissimilar
American War of Independence. There were about
forty thousand British troops in all India Another
forty thousand were gradually sent out from England
round the Cape of Good Hope, and a few thousand more
who were on their way to China were diverted to India

* Sir Thomas Mnnro had foretold, and Sir Charles Napier had
long afterwards repeated the prediction, that when nothing else was
left for us to conquer in India we should have to conquer our native
Army.

i857] HEROES OF THE MUTINY 277

In the meantime Havelock had organised his won-
derful little column at Allahabad, with which he set
himself to relieve both Cawnpore and Lucknow, and
John Nicholson was the largest figure in the successful
operations which ended in the capture of Delhi.
Havelock entered Cawnpore only to find that the
terrible Nana Sahib had avenged his discomfiture by
massacring all the English women and children.
Crossing the Ganges with a deepening horror in his
heart and a more splendid determination than ever in
his mind, Havelock fought battle after battle in his
attempt to reach and relieve Lucknow, until his noble
force, reduced by exhaustion and illness to a pigmy
size, was forced to fall back on Cawnpore. In Sep-
tember Outram, who was Havelock’s superior, brought
reinforcements, and the combined army started to-
wards Lucknow. Every English child knows how
the Lucknow Residency was relieved by that desperate
band of less than three thousand men, while the gallant
Outram served as a volunteer under Havelock, and
how the little army was in turn hemmed in and
besieged in Lucknow until it was relieved by Sir
Colin Campbell on November 17th, 1857. On Novem-
ber 22nd Havelock died: the type of the Christian
soldier whose fame will always shine clearly, even
among that constellation of chivalrous and great-
hearted soldiers who grappled with the unexampled
conditions of the Indian Mutiny. John Lawrence (the
“Saviour of India”), Henry Lawrence, Outram (the
“ Bayard of India ”), Havelock, Nicholson (Lord
Canning’s “ Tower of Strength ”), Colin Campbell ;
what names ! Their self-possession, courage, wisdom,
and humanity appear incomparably noble in contrast
with the hysterical clamour for recrimination which

2/8

THE MUTINY [Chap. XXIII.

marked a part of the British people, and particularly
the Europeans, of Calcutta at that time. Russell, who
had the good fortune to accompany Colin Campbell to
Lucknow when the city was captured from the rebels
in 1858, was, of course, too late to meet Havelock, but
he came to be the intimate and grateful companion
of Outram and to turn his acquaintance with Colin
Campbell into a lasting friendship.

But to look back to Russell’s voyage to India on
board the Valetta. During the monotonous days in the
Red Sea and Indian Ocean, he discussed to exhaustion
the affairs of India with the pundits who were his
fellow-passengers. After one of these discussions,
he wrote in his diary with a certain sadness and
weariness : —

“ Did they agree on any one point connected with the
Mutiny, or with the character of the people ? Not one.
One man hates the 'rascally Mahomedans,’ and says
there will be no safety for us till they are ‘ put down.'
Another thinks the Mahomedans might be made some-
thing of, but it is 'the slimy, treacherous Hindoo’ who
constitutes the real difficulty of the Government An
American, though ‘opposed to slavery in general
terms,’ thinks that the system of slave labour could be
introduced with advantage in some of the British
Possessions in the East, and quotes pass^es from the
Old Testament to support his views.” “The civilisers
of the world,” he ados, “ la race blanche, are naturally
the most intolerant in the world. They will forgive
no man who has a coloured stratum under the reU
mucosum. They have trodden under foot the last
germs of the_ coloured races wherever they could do
so ; in other instances they have hunted them out of
their own land into miserable exile ; as they advance
the barbarian recedes. It is the will of Providence ;
it is the destiny of the white man, to whom God
has given greater energy, intelligence, and physical
resources, that he should spoil the dusky Egyptian.
But do what we can or may, our race can neither

1858 ]

THE WEAKER SIDE

279

destroy the inhabitants of India as the Americans
destroyed the Red men, nor can it dispossess them
and drive them out to other regions as the Spaniards
drove out the Mexicans. And were it possible for us
to succeed, Hindustan would at once become a desert
in which our race would miserably perish in the first
generation. It would seem then, if these views are
right, that the Anglo-Saxon and his congeners in India
must either abate their strong natural feeling against
the coloured race, restrain the expression of their
antipathies, or look forward to the day, not far distant,
when the indulgence of their passions will render the
Grt)vemment of India too costly a luxury for the English
people."

Such words as these, repeated often in the diary,
are an average expression of the generous feelings
which moved Russell, not only then, but throughout
his life, to sympathise with the conquered race or the
weaker side. His habit brought him into frequent
collision with some of his political associates — he
always called himself a Conservative — and the right
was not invariably on his side; for the generous
man is also the hasty man. If in the present case
his words suggest an insufficient appreciation of
the vast service British government has rendered to
India in saving the country from being consumed by
racial wars of extermination, it is to be remembered,
not only that no passage removed from its context does
justice to the whole of a man’s thought, but that he
wrote at a time when horror and danger had not only
thrown the British public off its balance, but had
caused the ordinary social detachment from the natives
of many officials and officers in the service of the East
India Company to take on an extreme and discreditable
rancour. Of “destroying the inhabitants of India"
there was of course no question ; the inhabitants of India

280 THE MUTINY [Chap. XXIII.

were at that moment trying to destroy us. But Russell
emphasised a truth, which sadly needed emphasis.
He had nothing to gain by writing as he wrote later,
and he distinctly had a good deal to lose. So long as
he satisfied his scruples, by publishing what seemed
to him to be the truth, he was splendidly indifferent to
the personal discomfort which might follow. Such
discomfort had visited him oppressively in the Crimea,
and he did not know that in India, too, complaisance
would not be the only condition upon which his
presence would be suffered. The daily Press of any
nation might count itself happy in having as the
exemplar of a new kind of enterprise a man who
combined the power to interest and amuse with the
possession of unerring principle.

Near Calcutta news from the scene of action reached
the steamer. The Commander-in-Chief* had estab-
lished his headquarters at Cawnpore, and was preparing
there, for the accomplishment of an object not yet
announced.

“ But,” notes Russell, “what a silence about Havelock !
As we approach the soil to which he and his soldiers
had given a European interest, the splendour of his
reputation diminished.”

This strange silence about one whose name was in
the mouth of every man in England, reminded Russell
of the Crimean story of Corporal Brown

“ It was on the occasion of the first review of the
British Army, in the valley of Balaclava, a group of
the humbler class of T.G’s.,t who haunted the Army
at the end of the campaign, was stationed close to the
point at which the regiments of the Highland Division
were marching past towards the ground ; as each

Sir Colin Campbell had arrived in India in August,
t “Travelling gentlemen.”

1858] MILITARY REPUTATIONS

281

company wheeled round by this point, a long-legged,
lean, elderly man, with a Glengarry bonnet on his
head, a huge pair of horn spectacles on his nose,
dressed in a suit of shepherd’s plaid, addressed himself
generally to officers and men, and exclaimed with
great eagerness : ‘ Where’s Corporal Broon ; is Cor-
poral Broon among this lot? I wad be varra much
obleeged ti ye if you’d point me oot Corporal Broon ! ’
The poor man was in despair, for strangely enough, no
Corporal Brown replied. It appeared that he had read
in some north country paper an account of Corporal
Brown ‘ of ours ’ having gone into a Russian battery in
the night, killed the officer in command, driven out the
men at the point of the bayonet, and then having
returned with a number of trc^hies, among which were
shameful books, which the Corporal threw into the
watch fire. The anecdote struck deep into his mind,
particularly as the Corporal was in a Scottish regiment
(which had no Russian batteries opposed to it, but the
British public^ could never understand those matters),
and as it was insinuated that the Corporal came from
the same part of the country, the worthy man came
out to the Crimea with the firmest conviction that
Corporal Brown was the man of the day, and the deed
the event of the siege. But on the field they had never
heard of him.”

It need hardly be said that in due coxirse Russell
heard much of the splendid fame of Havelock, and that
in the country in which the fame was earned. But his
observations on the subject have been set down
because they contain a general truth, well known
to all soldiers, about the difference between the repu-
tation of a man with the Army and his reputation with
the public

Arriving at Calcutta on January ipth, 1858, Russell
drove to the Bengal Club, of which he had been made
an honorary member. A servant had been engaged
for him — a small, bright-eyed, slight-limbed man with
a curl of grey hair escaping from under his enormous

282

THE MUTINY [Chap. XXIII.

turban. He salaamed, and said: ‘‘My name Simon!
Me master’s servant,” and so took possession of Russell
and his belongings.

The chief event for Russell of the next few days
was an interview with the Governor-General, Lord
Canning. He found Lord Canning immersed in
books and papers, and literally surrounded by despatch
boxes.

“I had never seen him before,” writes Russell ; " but
the striking resemblance of the upper portion of his
face to the portraits and busts of George Canning would,
I think, have told me who he was.”

Lord Canning explained the military situation at
considerable length and with great clearness.

“I was astonished,” Russell writes, “to find a
Governor-General of India at such a time womdooking
and anxious, and heavy with care ; but when I learned
incidentally, and not from his own lips, that he had
been writing since early dawn that morning, and that
he would not retire till twelve or one o’clock that
night, and then had papers to prepare ere he started
in the morning, I was not surprised to hear that the
despatch of public business was not so rapid as it
mignt have been if Lord Canning had a little more
regard to his own ease and health.”

Lord Canning was anxious to make the path
smooth for Russell. He could not answer for what Sir
Colin Campbell would do when Russell arrived in
Cawnpore, but he gave him a letter which would
show that there was at least no desire on the part
of the British Government to have him kept out of
the British camp.

After the interview Russell wrote : —

“Lord Canning evinced a remarkable anal3^ical
power, a habit of appreciating and weighing; evidence
which made a deep impression upon me. His opinions,

i8s8] CANNING’S METHOD 283

once formed, seemed inebranlables, and his mode of
investigation, abhorrent of all intuitive^ impulses,
and dreading above all things quick decision, is to
pursue the forms of the strictest analysis, to pick up
every little thorn on the path, to weigh_ it, consider it,
and then to cast it aside or to pile it with its fellows ;
to go from stone to stone, strike them and sound
them, and at last on the highest point of the road, to
fix a sort of granite pedestal declaring that the height
is so-and-so, and the view is so-and-so — so firm and
strong that all the storm and tempest of the world
may beat against it and find it immovable. But man’s
life is not equal to the execution of many tasks like
these; such obelisks so made and founded, though
durable, cannot be numerous.”

Russell remained not quite a week at Calcutta, and
compared the hospitals very favourably with those
which he had seen in the Crimea.

“There is something almost akin to pleasure in
visiting well-ordered hospitals, and I renewed my
old sensations with interest ; but it is a feeling 1
would fain combat and remove. There is a morbid
and unwholesome excitement about it, after all.”

He remarked that there were more sword-cuts
among the wounds in the two chief hospitals than
he had seen after the battle of Balaclava Nowhere
could he get any precise information as to the
mutilation of women.

On February 4th he started for Cawnpore
travelling for the most part by gharry, “not by any
means an uncomfortable means of locomotion.”

“I am so anxious to get on,” he writes, “that I
stop at no bimgalows if I can help it, and travel day
and night.”

On the advice of his friends he had furnished
himself, in the old Indian manner, with plenty of
candles, salt and pepper. In those days an hotel

284

THE MUTINY [Chap. XXIII.

up country was a place where only beds and soda
water were provided ; whatever else a traveller
dispensed with, he would carry his salt-cellar and
pepper-pot, often taking them with him into private
houses. At the staging bungalows he noticed that
though they were in theory open to all, they were
virtually never used by any person, but Europeans.

“I have looked over the registries of many, and
found, perhaps in half-a-dozen instances in the space
of a year, the name of an Anglicised baboo, or Parsee
merchant, or native Prince inscribed therein. No !—
These and all such Government works are for the
white man and not for the black. The latter buries
himself in the depths of some wretched bazaar, or in
the squalid desolation of _ a tottering caravanserai.
-There would be as much indignation experienced in
any attempt on the part of the natives to use the
staging bungalows, as there is now expressed by
some Europeans in Calcutta at their audacity in
intruding upon ‘ladies and gentlemen’ in first-class
carriages.”

In one of the bungalows he noticed how the walls
were covered with the writing of men of the different
detachments which had passed up towards Cawnpore :
“Revenge your slaughtered countrywomen!” “To
hell with the Sepoys ! ” and so forth. All along the
road he was impressed by the sullen looks of the
natives.

“ In no instance is a friendly glance directed to the
white man’s carriage. Oh, that language of the eye 1
who can doubt ? — ^who can misinterpret it ? ”

At Allahabad he had a second interview with Lord
Canning, and found him just as he had first seen him,
surrounded by maps, boxes and documents. The
luxurious furnishing of the tent^ — purdahs of fine
matting, soft Persian carpets, glass doors, servants

1858] LORD MARK KERR 285

in the red and gold of the Viceregal livery — made a
great impression on Russell, though he afterwards
learnt that Lord Canning had rather curtailed the
regular establishment. Lord Canning introduced
him to Lieutenant Patrick Stewart, Deputy-Super-
intendent of the Indian Telegraphs, who arranged
to travel with Russell to Cawnpore. Lord Canning
also promised that Russell’s messages should be sent
next in order after service despatches.

Before leaving Allahabad Russell met Lord Mark
Kerr, of whom he writes : —

“ Those who know Lord Mark will be amused, and
I am certain he will not be offended, at the repetition
of the little incident at the railway station this
morning. Lord Mark, faithful to his peculiar vestiary
and sumptuary laws and customs, had his head
uncovered and his hair cut short, the result of which
was, that the sun had blistered his occiput severely.
He wore his old Crimean blue stpff trousers and long
imtanned leather riding-boots. Among the passengers
were a number of soldiers going back to their duty at
Cawnpore, one of whom had yellow crossbelts, and
seemed altogether, little as uniform is regarded in
India, very oddly dressed. Lord Mark saw him, and
came back in a few minutes, in a terrible rage.

“ ‘ There, what do you think. General, of the
discipline these fine fellows are kept in. One of
your Highlanders too ! I asked that fellow who he
was, and what regiment he belonged to. And what
do you think was his answer — his answer to me, Sir ?
Hang me, sir, but the fellow turned roxmd, stared at

me and said, “ What the is that to you ? ” Did

you ever hear such a thing ? '

“ * Well, what did you say ? ’

“ ‘ Say ? Why, I told him who I was, that I was
Colonpl of the 13th Regiment, and then the fellow
saluted, begged my pardon and said, “He never
would have thought itf” ’

“ Lord Mark did not mark the irony of the soldier,
which was certainly so far founded on fact, that it

286

THE MUTINY [Chap. XXIIL

would have been difiScult for anyone to have divined
that the person who stood before him, dressed as I
have described, with the addition of a ragged tunic of
red calico, wadded with cotton, was a colonel in
the Army.”

Travelling partly by train and partly by gharry,
Russell and Stewart reached Cawnpore, where Russell,
with as little delay as possible, visited the Commander-
in-Chief. Sir Colin Campbell’s reception of him was
frank and cordial After a few preliminary remarks
about the Crimea Sir Colin said : “Now, Mr. Russell,
I’ll be candid with you. We shall make a compact.
You shall know everything that is going on. You
shall know all my reports and get every information
that I have myself, on the condition that you do not
mention it in camp or let it be known in any way,
except in your letters to England.”

“I accept the condition, sir,” answered Russell,
“and I promise you it shall be faithfully observed.”

Sir Colin invited Russell to dine regularly at his
table, but as he gave him the option of joining the
Headquarters’ Staff Mess Russell preferred to have
the opportunity of subscribing to the expense of his
own maintenance. When he left the General, he
found that his tent was already struggling into life at
the comer of the street. What a tent it was !

“True, only a simple single pole,” he writes, “but
then it is on the Indian establistiment. I thought of
the miserable little shell of rotten calico under which
I braved the Bulgarian sun, or the ill-shaped tottering
Turkish tent in which I suffered from insects, robbers
and ghosts, not to mention hunger, in the onion bed
at Gallipoli ; of the poor fabric that went to the winds
on the 14th November before Sebastopol ; of the
clumsy Danish extinguisher-shaped affair under which
I once lived, and was so nearly ‘ put out,’ and then I

COLIN CAMPBELL

287

18S8]

turned round and round in my new edifice in ever-
renewed admiration. The pole is a veritable pillar,
varnished or painted yellow, with a fine brass socket
in the centre ; from the top spreads out the sloping
roof to the square side walls. The inside is curiously
lined with buff calico with a dark pattern, and beneath
one’s feet a carpet of striped blue and buff laid over
the soft sand is truly Persian in its yielding softness.”

“ We must send down to the bazaar,” said Stewart,
“ and get tables, chairs and charpoys (bedsteads), and
whatever else we want, such as resais, or quilted cotton
bedclothes, which serve as sheets, blankets and
mattresses all in one.”

“ But how on earth,” said Russell, “am I to carry all
those things ? ”

“ Make your mind quite easy about that ; you have
only to make a requisition on the Commissariat and
theyil provide animals enough to carry all Cawnpore
with you, if you are ready to pay for it”

After dining with the Commander-in-Chief, on the
same day Russell wrote : —

“There can be no more genial host or pleasant
company than Sir Colinu His anecdotes of the old
war, of his French friends, are vigorous and racy ; but
when you think of the dates, you are rather puzzled to
imagine how the gentleman who sits beside you,
looking so hardy and active, can have participated in
the scenes which occurred so many years before, and
mingled with people who have so long ago departed
from the world. He is no dull laudator tempons acti,
but gives to the present all its due.”

Colin Campbell told Russell that he had received a
letter lately from his friend General Vinoy, in which
the Frenchman expressed a strong opinion against
indiscriminate punishment The degree of the
provocation did not alter the fact that it was bad

288 ^ THE MUTINY [Chap. XXIII.

policy. “Zes represailks sont toufours inuiiles’' he
wrote.

Here is the appropriate place to reproduce what
Russell wrote about the strange meeting he had at
Constantinople and in the Crimea with Azimula Khan,
the right-hand man of Nana Sahib and, probably, the
real instigator of the Cawnpore massacre.

“ I may as well relate an incident in connection with
one of the Nana’s chief advisers, which I mentioned to
the Governor-General, who appeared much struck
with it. After the repulse of the Allies in their assault
on Sebastopol, i8th June, an event closely followed by
the death of Lord Raglan and a cessation of any
operations, except such as were connected with a
renewed assault upon the place, I went down for a
few days to Constantinople, and whilst stopping at
Missirie’s Hotel, saw on several occasions a handsome,
slim young man, of dark olive complexion, dressed in
an Oriental costume which was new to me, and
covered with rings and finery. He spoke French and
English, dined at the table d'note, and, as far as I could
make out, was an Indian Prince, who was on his way
back from the prosecution of an unsuccessful claim
against the East India Company in London. He had
made the acquaintance of Mr. Doyne, who was going
out to the Crimea as the superintendent of Sir Joseph
Paxton’s Army Works Corps, and by that gentleman
he was introduced to me one fine summer’s evening,
as we were smoking on the roof of the hotel. I did
not remember his name, but I recollect that he
expressed great anxiety about a passage to the Crimea,
‘ as,’ said he, ‘ I want to see this famous city, and those
great Roostums the Russians who have beaten French
and English together.’ Indeed, he added that he was
going to Calcutta, when the news of the defeat of
June i8th reached him at Malta, and he 'was so excited
by it that he resolved to go to Constantinople, and
endeavour thence to get a passage to Balaclava In
the course of conversation he boasted a good deal of
his success in London society, and used the names oi
people of rank very freely, which, combined with the

Reproduction of a Letter from Nana Sahib.

1858 ] THE NANA’S LIEUTENANT

289

tone of his remarks, induced me to regard him
with suspicion mingled, I confess, with dislike.
He not only mentioned his bonnes fortunes, but
expressed a very decided opinion that unless
women were restrained, as they were in the East,
‘ like moths in candlelight, they will fly and get
burned.’

“ I never saw or heard anything more of him till
some weeks afterwards, when a gentleman rode up to
my hut at Cathcart’s Hill, and sent me in a note from
Mr. Doyne, asking me to assist his friend Aximoola
Khan in visiting the trenches, and on going out I
recognised the Indian Prince. I had his horse put up,
and walked to the General’s hut to get a pass for him.
The sun was within an hour of setting, and the
Russian batteries had just opened, as was their custom,
to welcome our reliefs and working parties, so that
shot came bounding up towards the hill where our
friend was standing, and a shell burst in the air at
apparently near proximity to his post. Some delay
took place ere I could get the pass, and when I went
with it I found Azimoola had retreated inside the
cemetery, and was looking with marked interest at the
fire of the_ Russian g^s. I told him what he was to
do, regretting my inability to accompany him, as I was
going out to dinner at a mess in tne Light Division.

‘ Oh,’ said he, ‘ this is a beautiful place to see from ; I
can see everything, and, as it is late, I will ask you to
come some other day, and will watch here till it is
time to go home.’ He said laughingly, ‘ I think you
will never take that strong place ’ ; and in reply to me,
when I asked him to come to dine with me at my
friend’s, where I was sure he would be welcome, he
said, with a kind of sneer, ‘ Thank you, but recollect I
am a good Mahomedan I ’ ‘ But,’ said I, ‘ you dined at
Missirie’s ? ’ ‘Oh, yes : I was ioking. I am not such
a fool as to believe m these foolish thinga I am of no
religion.’ When I came home that night I found he
was asleep in my camp-bed, and my servant told me
he had enjoyed my stores very freely. In the morning
he was up and on, ere I was awake. On my table I
found a piece of paper — ‘Azimoola Khan presents his
compliments to Russell Esquire, and begs to thank

E. — ^VOL. I. c

290 THE MUTINY [Chap. XXIII.

him most truly for his kind attentions, for which I am
most obliged.’

“This fellow, as we all know, was the Nana’s
secretary, and chief adviser in the massacres at Cawn-
pore. Now, is it not curious enough that he should
have felt such an interest to see, with his own eyes
how matters were going in the Crimea ? It would not
be strange m a European to evince such curiosity ; but
in an Asiatic, of the non-military caste, it certainly is.
He saw the British Army in a state of some depression
and he formed, as I have since heard, a very unfavour-
able opinion of its moral and physique, in comparison
with that of the French. Let us remember that so€)n
after his arrival in India he accompanied Nana Sahib
to Lucknow, where they remained for some time, and
are thought by those who recollect their tone and
demeanour, to have exhibited considerable insolence
and hauteur towards the Europeans they met. After-
wards the worthy couple, on the pretenceof a pilgrimage
to the hills — a Hindoo and Mussulman joined in a holy
excursion !— visited the military stations all along the
mam trunk road, and went as far as Umballah. It has
been suggested that their object in going to Simla was
to tamper with the Goorkha regiment stationed in the
hills, but that finding on their arrival at Umballah a
portion of the regiment were in cantonments, they
were able to effect their purpose with these men, and
desisted from their proposed journey on the plea of the
cold weather. That the Nana’s demeanour towards
us should have undergone a change at this time is not
at all wonderful ; for he had learned the irrevocable
determination of the authorities to refuse what he — and,
let me add, the majority of the millions of Hindoos who
knew the circumstances— considered to be his just
rights as adopted heir of the ex-Peishwa of the
Mahrattas.”

CHAPTER XXIV

BEFORE LUCKNOW

Colin Campbell made Russell free of his stud till
he could procure horses for himself, and was as good
as his word in keeping him informed of the Army’s
plans. He would come over to Russell’s tent at all
times of the day or night with papers and explain the
position of affairs.

“And then I learned,” writes Russell, “not to the
detriment of the public service ; not to the diminution
of my self-respect; not to the deterioration of the
relations between the Commander-in-Chief and the
person whom he thus permitted to know his counsels
— that which it was to the advantage of the people in
England to know. And here let me say, that I do
sincerely believe, if gentlemen in the capacity in which
I presented myself, had come out to Sir Cohn
Campbell, properly accredited,^ .^Eey would have
received the same courtesies, facilities and kindnesses
which 1 have to acknowledge, though I quite dis-
associate them from my person, and attach them
unreservedly to the mission on which I was sent, and
which to the best of my ability I endeavoured to
fulfil”

In one of many conversations with Russell, Colin
Campbell laid the greatest stress on the importance of
handling soldiers judiciously when they are taken
under fire for the first time. “ It may take years to
make infantry which has once received a severe check
feel confidence in itself again; indeed, it will never be
done, perhaps, except by most careful handling. It is
still longer before cavalry, once beaten, recover the

292 BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV.

dash and enterprise which constitute so much of their
merit”

“ I understood him,” Russell observes, “ to allude to
the conduct of some of the regiments under Windham
at Cawnpore, which had been engaged in two unsuc-
cessful assaults against the Redan.”

Russell had not been many days in Cawnpore before
he made the acquaintance of Mr. John Walter Sherer,
who rendered distinguished service during the Mutiny,
and this acquaintance rapidly grew into a fast and
valuable friendship which lasted till Russell’s death.
Mr. Sherer, who was born in 1823, and is happily still
alive, went to India in 1846, when he became Assistant
Secretary to the Government of the North West
Provinces. In 1857 he was attached to Havelock’s
column in the advance on Cawnpore, and afterwards
became Magistrate at Cawnpore. There he was
installed at Duncan’s Hotel, of which he was obliged
for all practical purposes to act as landlord, and the
mess of those who lived with him served as a kind of
club. For the purpose of this biography he has been
so good as to write a few reminiscences of Russell at
that time.

“It is not necessary,” he writes, “to say that the
news that Russell was coming to Cawnpore created a
great deal of expectation and curiosity. Lord Clyde,*
It was well known, was anxious to stand well with
public opinion at home, and not at all anxious to fall
out with the Press. And therefore he was determined
that Dr. Russell should be invited to full intercourse
with the camp and staff, and should be kept informed
of all news and plans, sufficiently interesting in the
one case and matured in the other. Dr. Russell
formed one of the camp Mess, and on arriving at
Cawnpore had a tent assigned to him near those of the

* At this time he was still Sir Colin Campbell.

1858] MR. JOHN SHERER 293

Chief himself and Mansfield, who was right-hand man
at headquarters. We did not therefore see Dr.
Russell when he first came, but he was soon good
enough to call at Duncan’s Hotel, and the irnpression
formed from the first interview is thus given in ‘ Daily
Life.’* Mention was being made of strangers who had
visited Duncan’s Hotel. ‘ Besides Layard,’ the narrative
went on, ‘we had one or two travellers — ^a gentleman
who had volunteered for any kind of service, also one
of the Grenfell family, and greatest of all. Dr. W. H.
Russell, Special War Correspondent of the Times.
Coming in one forenoon I found a strongly-built rnan
of middle stature, with bright ej'-es and a merry smile,
and speaking with a slight Irish accent (and how
pleasant a slight Irish accent can be !) and dressed in
a frogged and braided frock-coat. This was Russell,
with whom we at once seemed to feel ourselves at
home.’ After a little ordinary conversation, it was
mentioned that Dxincan’s Hotel was an informal kind
of Club, and that it would give great pleasure to all
the members if Dr. Russell would come to dine. He
assented, and a date was fixed. We had a most agreeable
evening. No other room but the one large one where
we dined, was available, and therefore no moving after
dinner was thought o£ And in this emergency W'e
had recourse to the old collegiate fashion of singing,
though as no piano was forthcoming, we had the usual
difficulty with some of our soloists, that they started
in a key unsustainable when the high notes were
reached ; or rather, not reached. But as the landlord
of Duncan’s Hotel was, in some respects, musical, care
was taken to try to make the choruses harmonious,
and ‘ for Nature’s wood notes wild,” our evening enter-
tainments were up to such standard as could_ be
expected. Of course, revelry of this kind was suited
better for younger years than most of us could boast.
Tennyson, on re-visiting Cambridge, smiled to think
he could ever have joined

‘ th.e noise

0£ songs and clapping hands and boys

That crashed the glass and beat the floor.’

Mr. Sherer’s book, “ Daily Life During the Mutiny.”

294

BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV.

But it must be remembered that some of those at the
dinner table had supped full of horrors, and were glad
of any relaxations however unsatisfying. At any rate,
it was certainly true that it was a great pleasure, when
Dr. Russell ‘ was called upon ’ (as the phrase is) for a
song, to find he possessed an agreeable baritone voice,
and pronounced his words so distinctly that we could
follow them with ease. I find mentioned in ‘ Daily Life ’
that two songs especially pleased us, in one of which
the refrain was: ‘We will catch the whale, brave
boys,’ and another, ‘ O save me a lock of your hair.’ I
think he speaks in one of his letters to me of the ‘ final
crash.’ This referred to the extra care taken that our
last chorus before parting for bed should be of a
particularly effective character. My aspirations had
always been of a literary character, and I was fond of
books ; but I had never moved at all in literary circles,
and Dr. Russell’s acquaintance with many well-known
writers made me very anxious to pick up any parti-
culars concerning them. And he was good enough to
relate anecdotes of Thackeray, Browning and others,
which were especially delectable to me. And Russell,
perhaps, was not displeased to find _ an auditor to
whom he could speak of former days in London. In
this way our acquaintance may have grown more
intimate than under other circumstances might have
been the case.

“ I have a little vignette in my head which is of no
importance, but which helps to recall the scenery of
the time. It was just before the start for Lucknow.
Russell and itself are on horseback, and just entering
the town of Cawnpore, which had to be traversed to
reach the camp. We hear troops behind us, and Lord
Clyde himself on his great big charger with an AD.C.
The streets were mostly narrow, and suited only for a
couple of horses.

“ ‘ Going to Camp ? ’ called out Lord Clyde.

“ ‘Yes, we are.’

“ ‘ Come along then,’ and Dr. Russell took his place
by the Chiefs side, and I and the AD.C. immediately
made a second couple, and so we clattered along. In
quite a narrow place we met Mowbray Thomson, who
was now in charge of the Police. He was on Adonis,

1858] CALCUTTA AND CLEMENCY

295

the beautiful Arab which belonged to poor Major
Stirling of the 64th, and was known in the Camp.
The Arab, beautifully gentle but very excitable, very
nearly came down from high spirits ; but there was no
stopping, the Chief clattered on, and we clattered in
concert — on, on, on. Out of the town, however, the
road separated into tracks, and Lord Clyde waved
farewell and took his own way, and Russell and I were
alone again. Presently my mule carriage appeared.
I had had it sent on, and told Russell that as it was
growing dark I would drive him to his tent He
agreed, and as our horse-boys (in their wonderful
way) had come up, we dismounted and got into the
carriage. Dr. Russell was in a singing mood, and
began a popular air, to which I put a second, and so
in the rapid twilight we went along humming away
till _the_ tent was reached and we parted, not to meet
again till the British flag floated over Lucknow.

“ I have two other distinct scenes in my recollection,
but I cannot quite certainly place them chronologically.
But dates are of no value in a vignette like this I am
penning. One scene was his arriving at Duncan’s
Hotel, where a room had been provided for him. He
had been ill, but was on the mend. He looked pulled
down, and the table in his room had Calcutta papers
on it. For some reason, known perhaps to the
journalistic conscience, but not to be comprehended
by those who were merely readers. Dr. Russell had
become the object of violent disparagement and abuse
in the Indian Press. The papers were quite intolerant
of anybody who, for the sake of the feelings of those
who had lost friends or relations, tried to mitigate
the horrors which had occurred in the outbreak or
endeavoured to arrest any measures savouring of
revenge. Lord Canning was nicknamed ‘Clemency
Canning ’ ; others who advocated calmness or con-
sideration were picked out for attack Quite private
people, if they wrote to the papers details which were
less imfavourable than others which had been pre-
viously believed, were contradicted and insulted. A
letter of my own, which had somehow got printed, was
violently abused because I said in it that there was no
proof of any mutilation having taken place on the

BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV.

296

prisoners at Cawnpore* before death. This was quite
true, and was only said that relatives might cease to
imagine painful things, which, after all, might not have
occurred. For this I was politely designated a ‘ White
Sepoy ’ ! Well, Russell being not well, or at any rate
having been ill, felt this Calcutta rudeness more than
he would have done if he had been quite himself, and
sat down at table out of spirits. It is well known, of
course, that there is a stage in illness when all bad
symptoms have disappeared, and yet vitality is low
and depression manifest, and at this stage excitement,
if judiciously promoted, gives the required impetus,
and matters get better at once. We persuaded Dr.
Russell that a modicum of sound red wine would do no
harm. He took it ; conversation ensued, a meal became
possible and pleasant, spirits rose, natural sleep visited
his bed, and the next morning he was quite well and
prepared to assert that a miracle had been performed.

“ Colonel Inglis, of the old 32nd, who had been shut
up in the Baily Guard from the first, and on the death
of Sir Henry Lawrence had succeeded to the command
of the troops, was knighted in the winter of 1857—58.
In social life he was a man of pleasant manners and
kind heart, very popular with those with whom he had
to do. Handsome, too, in face and person, his bearing
was distinguished and military, and he was always
very particular about dress. Vve asked him to dine at
our mess, and he willingly agreed to do so. Russell
was with us, and said after dinner, in a few welLchosen
words, how glad all who had the pleasure of Sir John
Inglis’s acquaintance were at the honour which had
been bestowed upon him. Russell was quite the life
of the evening, full of anecdotes^ and laughter, again
singing some capital songs, and joining in the ‘ final
crash ’ of which I have already spoken.

“There was one characteristic of Dr. Russell I
especially admired, which was that he could not be
interrupted. W e others, if we had any writing to do,
were distracted if anyone talked or read out, or in any
way suggested to us different subjects from the one we
were endeavouring to express. W e wrote nonsense

» Mr. Slaerer, it may be said here, was the first Englishman to
look down the well in which so many English bodies lay.

HIS EYE A LENS

297

1858]

or repeated sentences more than once, or mis-spelt,
and finally grew peevish and used informal language.
Not so at all Dr. Russell. He would be sitting pen in
hand, writing his diary or what not You entered.

“ ' I hope I am not disturbing you ? ’

'“Not in the least I am all ears ; go on.’

“You went on, told your tale, he listening and
answering if necessary. You stopped. His eye
dropped on his paper ; his pen moved ; he recovered
the thread of his writing without difficulty, and with
an unembarrassed continuity. Theophile Gautier had
the same faculty.”

After praising Colin Campbell’s wisdom in taking
Russell into his confidence, Mr. Sherer continues : —

“Dr. Russell availed himself fully of his privileges,
without in any way abusing his position. Keeping, as
he did as far as it was possible, always at headquarters
and in communication with the Chief, with Mansfield,
Norman, ^d the rest, he obtained early and quite
authentic information. And then his amazing powers
of observation enabled him, though in a new scene, to
supply backgrounds and accessories so sympatheti-
cally that the true Oriental atmosphere was produced.
Some time after the Mutiny I went home on the same
ship with Meredith Townsend,* of the Spectator, him-
self a picturesque writer ; and talking one day about
Russell’s letters on the troubles in India, he said, ‘ You
see the man’s eye was a lens ; it afforded him micro-
scopic aspects which he put on paper, and behold ! the
objects were there in all their minute veracity.’ And
then the tone was so manly and just ! No trace of
party feeling or the desire to chime in with the
views of the man in the street He knew the English
public really wished for the plain truth, and that he
endeavoured to give them, and only that”

Mr. Sherer concludes ; —

“ In later years in England our paths lay far apart,
and we never met But occasionally some little

* When Rnssell was in India Mr. Townsend was editor of
Friend of India, which he invested with rare distinction and ability.
He was afterwards joint-editor of the Spectator with R. H. Hutton.

29S

BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV.

incident occurred which led to an exchange of letters.
In the last communication I received the handwriting
was not his own, but he signed the letter, and under
his name he added in a firm hand a few Latin words,
which may be rendered, ‘ Not unmindful of an ancient
friendship.’ ”

In the early hours of February 27th, 1858, Russell
crossed the Ganges into Oudh. This day saw the
beginning of Colin Campbell’s march to capture
Lucknow. When Colin Campbell had been compelled
to return to Cawnpore in the previous November
without capturing the city, he had left Outram to hold
Alumbagh, four miles from Lucknow, as a post of
observation and to assure the Sepoys, as it were, that
a British Army would return as soon as possible to
settle accounts with them.

After three days’ march through the enemy’s country
Russell wrote that he had just met Thomas Henry
Kavanagh, the hero of one of the most memorable
deeds of daring in our history. This civilian, holding
a humble position in the service of the East India
Company, had volunteered in November to go out of
the Residency disguised as a native in order to carry a
message to Colin Campbell.*

“ How he could ever have made himself look like a
native I know not,” writes Russell. “ He is a square-
shouldered, larged-limbed, muscular man, a good deal
over the middle height, with decided 'European
features ; a large head covered with hair of — a reddish
auburn, shall I say? — a moustache and beard still
lighter, and features and eyes such as no native that
ever I saw possessed. He was dressed in some sort
of blue uniform tunic — ^that of the Volunteer cavalry, I
believe — white cords and jack boots and felt helmet,

* Kavanagh’s own account of his exploit shows that the disguise
was of the roughest. “ I had little confidence in it,” he wrote, “ and
I trusted more to the darkness of the night.”

THE DILKUSHA

299

1858]

and was well armed — heavy sabre and pistols. He is
open, frank, and free in manner ; and I believe those
grand covenanted gentlemen who did not mention his
name in any of their Lucknow reports, regard him as
‘not one of us.’ But Mr. Kavanagh may console him-
self. He has made himself famous by an act of remark-
able courage — ^not in the heat of battle, or in a moment
of impulse or excitement, but performed after delibera-
tion, and sustained continuously through a long trial.
If the Victoria Cross were open to civilians (and why
should it not be?) there is no one who deserves it
better than this gentleman. And, indeed, I believe
from his conversation to-day, that the hope of wearing
it was one of the mainsprings of his devotion. He
left wife and children in the garrison, and went out on
his desperate errand, which, even to the sanguine,
seemed hopeless.”

When Colin Campbell arrived in front of Lucknow
Russell made his way to the Dilkusha, where head-
quarters were established. He crossed the courtyard,
ascended the steps to the hall and thence, through the
ruins of crystal chandeliers, tapestries, pictures, and
furniture, mounted to the roof.

“ A vision indeed I ” he writes. “A vision of palaces,
minars, domes, azure and golden, cupolas, colonnades,
long facades of fair perspective in pillar and column,
terraced roofs, all rising up amid a calm and still ocean
of the brightest verdure. Look for miles and miles
away, and still the ocean spreads, and the towers of
the fairy city gleam in its midst Spires of gold glitter
in the sun. Turrets and gilded spheres shine like
constellations. There is nothing mean or squalid to
be seen. There is a city more vast than Paris as it
seems, and more brilliant, lying before us. Is this a
city in Oude ? Is this the capital of a semi-barbarous
race, erected by a corrupt, effete and degraded
d3masty ? I felt inclined to rub my eyes again and
again.”

From the roof of the Dilkusha Russell watched the
bombardment of the city for several days.

300

BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV.

“ I could not but be struck,” he wrote on March 4th,
"with the admirable personnel of our officers as they
stood chatting in groups to-day. Sir Colin, in spite of
a slight stoop, is every inch a soldier in look and
bearing-spare, muscular, well-poised on small, well-
made Feet, to which some utilitarian bootmaker has
done scant justice, and given plenty of leather; one
arm held straight down by the side, with clenched fist,
the other used with easy gesture ; his figure shows
but little trace of fifty years of the hardest and most
varied service beyond that which a vigorous age must
carry with it ; the face is marked, indeed, with many
a seam across the brow, but the mouth, surmounted by
a trimmed short moustache, is clean-cut and firm,
showing a perfect set of teeth as he speaks ; the jaw,
smooth and broad, is full of decision ; the eyes, of the
most piercing intelligence, full of light and shrewdness.
General Mansfield, taller than his chief, well made
and broad chested, gives some indications of his extras
ordinary attention to the labours of the desk and study
in a ‘ scholar’s slope ’ about the shoulders. His face
is handsome — a fine oval with a vigorous jaw, com-
pressed arch lips, full of power ; a well-formed nose,
and a brow laden with thought ; his sight is not good,
and he is obliged to wear glasses or spectacles, which
he holds rather aloft, giving himself the air of our
friend at the banquet of Nasidienus, '■omnia suspendens
naso.' It is this, probably, which has made some
people think the general is supercilious; but I am
satisfied no one will find him so who has to approach
him on business.”

Russell seldom dared to leave the roof lest some-
thing important should happen in his absence ; he
would take there his writing materials and his luncheon
of salt beef and rum and water. One easily believes
him when he remarks that it was not quite a good
place for study or composition.

“ In the first place. Peel has got four heavy guns into
position on the left, close to the house, which, with the
two guns and two howitzers on the right, augmented

DANGEROUS FISHING

301

1858]

now by two more guns, keep up a constant fire on the
Martiniere, and on the suburb near it, as well as on
the enemy’s rifle-pits.”

On March sth Russell’s passion for fishing induced
him to make a rather risky expedition to the Gumti,
where he had been told that mahseer and other fly-
taking fish abounded. Finding the river full of people
bathing — camp-followers with horses, camels and
elephants — he and Stewart went further up stream to
a spot nearer the city. He was fishing away without
success, but probably not the less happily for that,
when Stewart’s servant cried out, “Deko! Sahib!
deko ! Badmash hai ! ” (“ Look, sir, there is a black-
guard ! ”) The man pointed with his finger to some
high com on the opposite side of the river. Stewart
was bathing, and his clothes were on the bank
Russell picked them up, and he and Stewart, seeing
plainly a movement in the com, went off with as much
dignity as was consistent with an effectual retreat
Some Sepoys were indeed there, but they were not
aware that their quarry had gone till they came close
on to the river. Then they stood up and fired a volley,
which hit the ground about Russell and Stewart, but
did not touch them. Thus Russell repeated a certain
Crimea incident when he fished in the stream near
Baidar and was obliged, under the fire of Cossacks, to
retire in a hurry with his flies streaming in the air
behind him and being tom off one by one in the
grass.

On this same day, when he was talking to Colin
Campbell on the roof of the Dilkusha, a round shot
rushed by the turret near them and fell in the court-
yard, which was full of men. Russell exclaimed
involuntarily, “That’s done harm, I fear!” Colin

302 BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV.

Campbell, who was stud3dng a map, apparently never
raised his head, but merely interpolating the words,
“None whatever,” in the middle of a sentence, went
on with his exposition.

On March 7th Outram’s column marched to within
sight of Colin Campbell’s camp. The Sepoys, who
had gone out from Lucknow to attack him, all fell back
on the city before his advance, and communication at
once became possible between the two British camps.
Two days later Russell, standing by Colin Camp-
bell at his usual post, watched the assault of the
Martini^re. When the supreme moment arrived,
“Here, Mr. Russell,” said Colin Campbell, handing
him his glass, “I’ll make you aide-de-camp for the
time ; your eyes are better than mine — just look
through the trees on the right of the Martinifere, and
tell me who are the people you see there.” “ They
are Highlanders and Sikhs, sir ; I can see them clearly.
They are firing through the trees and advancing very
rapidly I ”

“Then we’ll go over to the Martinibre,” was the
answer.

The camp dinner in the evening was very animated,
and Colin Campbell explained to Russell all the points
of his successful plan of attacL He insisted on the
value of the flank movement by Outram, but was
careful to let it be seen that he had originated the
operation, and had, indeed, kept it so strictly to himself
that Outram did not know the plan till the night before
he crossed the Gumti. Hodson dined at Mess that
night

“A very remarkable man,” writes Russell; “bem
sabreur, and a man of great ability. His views, ex-
pressed in strong, nervous langpiage, delivered with

SIR JAMES OUTRAM

303

1 8 58]

fire and ease, are very decided, but he takes a military
rather than a political view of the state of our relations
with India.”

On March i2th Russell rode over to Outram’s head-
quarters — a few tents pitched under some trees near a
pretty mosque, which had suffered from the British
cannon. Outram insisted that Russell should dine and
sleep at his quarters. Here is Russell’s picture of
Outram : —

“ His forehead is broad, massive, sagacious but
open ; his eye, which is covered with a shaggy brow,
is dark, full of penetration, quick and expressive ; his
manner natural and gracious ; his speech is marked
by a slight hesitation when choosing a word, but is
singularly correct and forcible ; and his smile is very
genial and sympathetic. He is of middle size, is very
stoutly built, and has a slight roundness of the shoulder,
as if from study or application at the desk.”

Before dinner Russell rode to the Badshah-Bagh, a
faded palace, where the Welsh Fusiliers were enjoying
themselves intensely among the orange trees and
trickling fountains. In one of the rooms was a portrait
of the late King of Oudh, which Russell received per-
mission to carry off with him — an interesting bit of
loot, but of no great value.* Dinner that evening was
a delicious experience ; the table, lighted with lamps,
was spread under a giant tree before the mosque ; and
everyone enjoyed the soda water and port wine which
Outram had saved from his stores at the Alum-Bagh
and characteristically shared with all comers.

The next day Russell rode with Outram, and on

* Russell relates that afterwards Thackeray used often to stand
transfixed before this picture of the sleek potentate in gorgeous
raiment. “Poor old thing! Poor old dearl” he would exclaim,
“ How fine and how silly he looks 1 ^

304

BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV.

returning with him to camp in the evening was shocked
to hear that Hodson was dead.

“ I felt that we had sustained in India,” he wrote,
“a loss which is really national. I must confess
I do not altogether approve of anything but the
extraordinary courage and self-possession which
marked his conduct in shooting down the sons of
the King of Delhi ; but at the same time I freely admit
that I was impressed so strongly by Hodson’s energy,
force of character, and intelligence, that I should douk
the propriety of my own judgment if I found it was
opposed to his in some matters connected with the
treatment of natives.”

March 14th was a great day, for then the Kaisar-
Bagh was captured. Only the night before Colin
Campbell had been talking of the hard work there
would be in forcing the Sepoys out of their various
positions. Early in the morning Russell met Outram,
who seemed pleased with the progress made, but, like
Colin Campbell, said there was still much fighting
ahead. In the afternoon Russell was sitting in camp,
where all the headquarters’ people, who were not busy
with other work, were enjoying their cheroots and
reading the papers, when a very heavy fire of musketry
sprang up and as quickly died away. An orderly soon
dashed up with a piece of folded paper in his hand. A
few moments later Russell saw Norman going by "at
his usual canter” and called out, “What is it,
Norman? Have we got the Imambara?” “The
Imambara 1 Why, man, we’re in the Kaisar-Bagh I ”

Russell hurried off, and never afterwards forgot the
wild scene in the Kaisar-Bagh— both exhilarating
and distressing — when the discipline of the assault
snapped and the torrent of pillage and destruction
began.

PILLAGE

305

1858]

“At every door there is an eager crowd, smashing
the panels with the stocks of their firelocks, or break-
ing the fastenings by discharges of their weapons.”

Lying among the orange groves were dead and
dying Sepoys, and the white statues were reddened
with blood. Leaning against a smiling Venus was a
British soldier shot through the neck, gasping and
dying. Here and there officers were running to and
fro among their men, persuading and threatening in a
vain attempt to stop the devastation.

Out of the broken doors soldiers issued laden with
loot — shawls, rich tapestries, gold and silver brocade,
caskets of jewels, arms, and splendid dresses. Some
came out with china or glass, dashed it to pieces on
the ground, and ran back to look for more valuable
booty; others were gouging out the precious stones
from pipes, saddle-cloths, or the hilts of swords.
Through court after court the troops rushed in an
ecstasy of plundering.

One man who burst open the lid of a leaden-looking
box, which was actually made of silver, drew out an
armlet of emeralds, diamonds, and pearls, so large
that Russell could not at first believe that they
were real stones. “What will your honour give
me for these ? ” said the man ; “ I’ll take a hundred
rupees on chance.” “I will give you a hundred
rupees,” said Russell ; “ but it is right to tell you, if
the stones are real they are worth a good deal more.”
“Here, take them,” said the man. “Well, then,”
replied Russell, “you must come to me at head-
quarters camp to-night, or give me your name and
company, and I’ll send the money to yoa” “Oh,
faith and your honour, how do I know where I’d be
this blissid night?” said the man. Russell felt

X

R» — ^VOI« I.

3o6

BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV.

himself unable to argue against the propriety of the
jolly thriftlessness which prevented the man from
agreeing to anything but a ready money transaction,
and passed on without the jewels. He afterwards
heard that these stones were sold by an officer for
£7, <>00. The only memento of these scenes which
Russell brought away was a picture entitled “Cleo-
patra,” by Sir William Beechey. The story goes
that the original of the picture was a fair Circassian,
the King of Oudh’s favourite wife,* who had the fancy
to be painted in this role.

A great deal of fighting took place in the narrow
streets, but on the part of the enemy it was con-
ducted by a comparatively small number of daring
marksmen, who covered the retreat of their friends.
At dinner in the evening Russell noticed that Colin
Campbell was rather silent, and concluded that he
was thinking that people at home would be dissatisfied
at the escape of most of the rebels.

For several days Russell stayed in Lucknow, and
he soon learned to admire Outram as he admired no
other soldier whom he met in his long career.

“ He is most careful of all the soldiers’ comforts,” he
writes, “ and he seldom gives an order which is not
accompanied by a gift of a cheroot, if he has one left.”

He describes, too, how Outram used to sit “like
a guest at his own table,” which was crowded by the
various officers whom his hospitality brought pouring
in upon his perplexed aides-de-camp. Outram used
to express to Russell the most liberal opinions about
the settlement of Oudh, and Russell gathered, from
one or two remarks he let drop, that he was shaken

* The picture is now in the possession of Mrs. Thornhill, Russell’s
elder daughter.

1858]

OUTRAM AND CANNING

307

in his belief that his advice, which had led to the
annexation of the Province, was sound. He made
a note that Outram belonged to the group of men
who are great enough to admit their mistakes.

One day Russell went to see the Begums and their
attendants, who were guarded in the Martiniere. He
found them all in one large, low, dark and dirty room,
without windows, on the ground floor, and his
entrance was the signal for a shrill uplifting of voices
and passionate exclamations from the ladies who were
crouched round the walls. The Begum herself, a
shrivelled old woman, led the chorus, complaining of
the food, of want of raiment and liberty and money,
of the servants, and many other things ; and at each
request- she received the support of her retinue in a
sharp antistrophe.

Passing on to Banks’s Bungalow, Russell found
Outram busy sending out the Proclamation of Lord
Canning. He procured a copy, which he sent to
London, “where, no doubt,” he remarked, “it will
excite as much disapprobation as it does here. I have
not heard one voice raised in its defence.” Two days
later it was known that Outram was going to Calcutta
at his own request as he felt himself unable to carry
out the Viceroy’s policy.

“ It is strange,” wrote Russell, “ that in the course
of a few years, the man who, as Resident at Luck-
now, recommended the annexation of Oude should
now, as Commissioner of the revolted British Province,
feel himself obliged to force on the consideration of
the supreme Government the claims of the rebels to
more liberal treatment than Lord Carming is disposed
to offer them.”

Lord Canning, of course, assumed that the fall of
Lucknow had been followed by the submission of all

3o8

BEFORE LUCKNOW [Chap. XXIV-

Oudh, and that he was in a position to confiscate all
the lands of the Province ; but the fact was that at that
moment such a policy was quite impossible. The
Province had still to be regarded as the enemy’s
country ; few chiefs were not holding out, and the
capture of Lucknow had merely dispersed the rebels,
so that they strengthened the hands of the rajahs and
zemindars. As time went on Lord Canning, who
was a sagacious man always ready to fit his policy
to the circumstances, made many modifications in his
Proclamation.

During the short time that Outram stayed at
Lucknow Russell established himself at his quarters
in Banks’s Bungalow. He noted in particular one
conversation he had with him; he happened to
mention that a Russian general, who was con-
demning Menschikoffs position on the Alma, stated
that a river was the worst possible defence, that
a daring enemy could always cross it, that the army
which was attacked was always beaten, and that there
was in fact no remarkable instance in history of a river
being successfully used as a line defence. Outram
combated this view ably and at much length, and in
doing so surprised Russell with his ripe knowledge
of military history.

CHAPTER XXV
THE ROHILKHAND CAMPAIGN

Three or four days after Outram’s departure from
Lucknow Russell was attacked by dysentery, and
foreseeing that he would have little chance of recover-
ing quickly where he was, he had himself carried
down to Cawnpore in a dooly. There he went to
Mr. Sherer’s house, and found a clean charpoy ready
for him, tea, fresh milk, a dark room, punkahs, and
repose. He was still very ill, but became fairly
desperate at the smell and sight of the mess dinner
which was being prepared. He dashed away the
bumper of congee water and the dish of arrowroot
and went in madly for claret and curry. Saved my
life by this stroke of genius,” says the diaiy.

While he was at Cawnpore he received the follownng
letter from Outram : —

Allahabad,

April Sihj iSsS.

“ My Dear Russell, — You must have thought me
a heartless wretch to part from you without thanking
you as I ought for the letter— so kind, so generous,
so full of warm feeling— which I had just received
from you before parting. But it was not heartless-
ness, my dear Russell, that tied my tongue. I could
not trust myself to speak. It was to me a day of
strong emotions, and your letter added much to their
intensity. Eager as I was — my work done — to depart
from Lucknow, the act of departure was a painful
one.^ To take leave of a place where one has enacted
an important part, either for good or evil, and
exercised an influence over men’s fortunes and happi-
ness in its moral effects on the individual, resembles

310 ROHILKHAND CAMPAIGN [Chap. XXV.

the approach of death. Memory is busy ; conscience
insists on being heard ; harsh acts or words, unre-
membered since they were done or uttered, come
crowding on the recollection. The dead seem to
speak to you from their graves — it may be in love or
in sorrow or in reproach. And regarding each rti sti
you meet whose prospects you have, or might have,
influenced, you are compelled to ask yourself how
you have acquitted yourself of the solemn responsi-
bility. As regards Lucknow, I had to feel all this to
a very painful extent; and those were very solemn
questions which I felt I had to answer to my God
before I dared depart. Such thoughts unhinge a man
— they unsex him ; I was unhinged, and I dared not
give utterance to the feelings your letter excited

“ That letter I shall ever treasure, and so will my
family. And I shall treasure it, not because it is the
flattering and warmly-written letter of a man of
European fame, but Because it is the letter of an
honest, truth-telling man ; because I feel assured that,
however exaggerated are the tributes to myself
which it contains, these exaggerations are the honest
expression of the exaggerated estimate with which
your' warm, generous, large heart has beguiled your
intellect in reference to one whom you believe to
have striven to do his duty to God and man. Yes,
my dear Russell, I do prize it, and will treasure it,
and from the bottorn of my soul I thank you for it,
I shall ever esteem it a privilege to have made your
acquaintance and an honour to be regarded by you
as a friend. I fear I have often appeared rough and
regardless towards you, for much physical suffering
and many public anxieties have made me rough and
cross to all. But your letter assures me that I have
your entire forgiveness, and that you regard my
hastiness and petulance as the accidents, not the
essentials, of my character. God bless you for doing
me what 1 believe to be a mere act of justice ; but all
men do not so discriminate, nor are all so merciful
in their judgments.

“ If at any time you can find time to favour me with
a commission to execute for you in Calcutta it will
afford me very great pleasure to do so, for I look

1858]

RUSSELL’S SUCCESS

311

upon you as booked with the Indian Army for months
to come. If dit any time, in any way, I can be of assist-
ance to you, either in your personal or professional
matters, I shall esteem it a privilege to be permitted
to be so, and I shall look forward to your favouring
Lady Outram and myself as our guest when you may
come to Calcutta on your way home.

“ Believe me to be, my dear Russell, in all truth,
your admiring and sincerely attached friend,

“J. Outram.”

On the same day that Outram wrote this. Delane
wrote a letter from London in which he said : —

“ I have nothing but to congratulate you on the
perfect success with which you have sustained your
fame. I feel myself, and hear everybody saying, that
we are at last beginning to learn something about
India, which was always before a mystery — as far
removed from our sight and which it was as impossible
to comprehend as the fixed stars. The public feeling
has righted itself more promptly than was to be
expected, and we had before the recess a debate in
which the most humane instead of the most blood-
thirsty sentiments were uttered. The key to the
savage spirit was the ‘ atrocities,’ and these seem to
have resolved themselves into simple massacre.”

At the same time Mr. J. C. MacDonald wrote from
the Times office : —

” You will be glad to have confirmed to you the
assurance that your work has given entire satisfaction
here, and that we consider you have amply sustained
your old supremacy over all competitors. Some of the
electric letters were astonishingly vivid ; and so far
from joining in the outcry against the wire as unfavour-
able to literary effect, my decided conviction now is
that in competent hands it may be made to jdeld the
most brilliant results. I have not yet been called on
to pay the Indo-European bill for telegraphing ; but I
reckon that altogether we shall not get out of this job
for telegrams alone under ;£’S,ooo. It was, however.

312 ROHILKHAND CAMPAIGN [Chap. XXV.

one of those occasions on which it would never have
done for us to have been content with moving neck
and neck with the penny papers.”

Russell was soon followed to Cawnpore by Colin
Campbell, who had made up his mind to keep the
enemy moving by marching his column quickly through
certain districts. Russell accompanied him during his
trying series of night marches, and a passage describing
a specimen march is here taken from the diary : —

“Chowbeypore to Poorwah. Oh, Sir Colin, this is
very severe! At 2.15 this morning we were on our
way to Poorwah, thirteen miles. The fatigue and
monotony of these slow, long marches in the dark are
indescribable. You can see nothing. Unrefreshed by
sleep, only half awake, every moment you catch your-
self just going over the horse’s shoulder. You must
look out lest you ride over soldiers or camp-followers
who throng the road, mingled with flocks of goats,
sheep, tats or ponies, camels, bullocks, begum-carts,
all shrouded in dust and darkness. At last dawn
comes, very slowly, no glory in it, no clouds on the
horizon ; there is a dim fog of dust, a haze which hides
the sun. There is no colour, no atmosphere. The
moment the sun shows above the haze he burns you
like fire. As you pass through the villages, ghost-like
figures clad in white rise from their charpoys, which
are laid out in the street, stare at you for a moment
and sink to sleep again. Early marches, how I hate
youl And yet you must be, for the men must be got
under cover ere the sun is long out. It is joy indeed
to come up to the camping-ground, and to find the
mess-dooly already established in full play under some
fine tree, to join the group which is lying on the
ground among the ants and dried leaves — alas 1 there
is no grass — and to get the first gulp of refreshing tea.
I have hired two bullock-hackeries, which come along
very nicely with my effects, and Sherer gave me two
splendid black jenny-goats on starting from Cawnpore,
which set me up every morning with abundance of
delicious milk.”

A BAD KICK

313

1858]

One evening a curious thing, trifling yet embar-
rassing, happened to Russell. He had dined with
Colin Campbell, and after a long talk with him and
General Mansfield, departed for his tent. Somehow
he went wrong and could not find it He wandered
among the trees and tents in the dark, and at last was
obliged to shout at the top of his voice for his servant
Simon. No one answered, at least not audibly,
although Russell conjectured that many impolite
answers hung sequestered in the breeze. At last,
quite savage, he walked straight ahead till he came to
a charpoy in the open and, shaking the sleeper, cried
“ Who’s here ? Can you tell me where my tent is ? ”
It was Colin Campbell himself, who, wnde awake in a
moment, gazed at Russell in some wonder. Russell,
with equal -wonder, apologised and told his story,
whereupon Colin Campbell laughed and said, “ Well,
take a fresh departure from this point now, and you
must come upon your tent down this street” Russell
did so, and distinguished himself by nest walking in
upon General Mansfield, who was sitting in his tent
reading. After disturbing a considerable part of the
camp, he reached his tent at last

At the end of April, Colin Campbell crossed the
Ganges into Rohtikhand. In the early hours of one
morning, soon after crossing the river, Russell had a
most unfortunate accident, from which he was to suffer
for a long time to come. A halt had been called, and
his horse, standing among some uproarious stallions
which were lashing out -violently, was in danger of
being injured. Russell ran to save the animal, and
just as he was getting up to his head a powerful Arab
stallion ran back to have a last kick at his enemy, and
delivered a murderous fling, from which Russell could

314 ROHILKHAND CAMPAIGN [Chap. XXV.

not escape. He was standing against his own horse
as though with his back to a wall. He saw the shoes
of the Arab flash in the moonlight. In an instant he
was sent flying along the ground under his horse’s
belly. One heel had struck him on the stomach, but
the scabbard of the sword he wore broke the force of
that blow ; the other heel had caught him in the hollow
of the right thigh. He was picked up and helped on
to the tumbril of a gun, where he sat in great pain,
faint, sick and burning with thirst. He arrived in camp
almost fainting, and the next day found himself utterly
incapacitated by his injuries.

For many days after that he had to be carried with
the column in a dooly.

“ Everyone,” he wrote, “ bullies dooly-bearers ;
therefore, to avoid knocks and whip cuts, they go off
into the open and expose one to the risk of being cut
up by the enemy’s cavalry.”

Often reports would be brought that the enemy
were strong on this or that flank, and several times
Russell found it very unpleasant to be out on a wide
plain in his dooly with only a cloud of dust in the
distance to show where the column was. Three days
after the kick he was in a worse case than ever.

“ In much pain to-day,” he wrote ; “ a large lump
forming in the hollow of the thigh from near the knee
to within an inch of the hip. Twenty-five leeches
were put on the calf of my leg as soon as we halted.
Why on the calf? Bleed, and bear, and ask no
questions.”

In such misery as this, living on starvation diet and
sacrificing to the leeches what little substance he had
left, he was jolted along towards Bareilly, where it
was practically certain a battle would be fought.

1858]

TAKING PRECAUTIONS

315

Looking out of his dooly at dawn after a particularly
wretched march through the night, he observed with
some concern that two other doolies in which sick
officers were being carried were the only portions of
the British force in sight And the pickets had
reported many of the enemy’s sow'ars capering about
in their front

“ As I have resolved not to be cut up without a fight
for it,” Russell writes, “ I had up my syce this morning
and warned him under terrible pains and penalties
to lead my best horse always close to my_ litter
ready for mounting, with one revolver loose in the
holster.”

In the evening Colin Campbell came into Russell’s
tent and found him very weak, with a huge blister
applied from knee to hip. “ Those fellows will fight
to-morrow,” said Sir Colin. “ All our reports declare
they will stand. I am soriy you are not a little better
able to be with us.” Sir Colin w’as not mistaken.
Early the next morning the whole Arm}', with cavalry
and guns, proceeded to the attack of the enemy, w'ho
was in position. Arrangements were made for the
three doolies, containing Russell and two sick officers,
Sir David Baird and Alison, to be carried at the head
of the infantry column on the right or off side, as the
enemy was on the left front Before the start Russell
called his syce and told him once more to keep his
best horse close to the dooly. Baird and Alison gave
the same directions. As it turned out, this precaution
saved Russell’s life.

“ Looking out of my portable bedstead,” he writes,
“ I could see nothing but legs of men, horses, camels
and elephants moving past in the dusk, the trees were
scanty by the roadside, there was no friendly shade to

3i6 ROHILKHAND campaign [Chap. XXV.

afford the smallest shelter from the blazing sun. I had
all the sensations of a man who is smothering in a
mud bath.”

About noon, during one of the numerous halts, some
shots were fired in front, and he had himself carried
over to the left side of the road, which was blocked by
men and baggage. Some round shot from the enemy
came among the cavalry, and he noticed the infantry
ahead of him deploying. The delay which followed
was long. Every moment the heat became more
fearful More than one British soldier was carried
past him fainting or dead. He had been given two
bottles of wine out of Colin Campbell’s store, and he
gave a cupful to one poor fellow who was laid down
by his dooly, pouring it down his throat with difficulty,
for the teeth were set. The man recovered a little,
looked at Russell, said “ God bless you,” tried to rise,
gasped, and fell dead.

So many shocks were given to his dooly when the
heavy guns began to move along the road that Russell
told the bearers to carry him to a small tope in a field
on the left. He found that the tope, which after all
was only a small cluster of bamboos and other trees,
was farther away than he thought and was not very
shady. Here his dooly was placed near Baird’s, and
the bearers crept in among the bamboos. Sudden
splutters of musketry arose and died away. Each
j)romise of something ended in nothing. Soon Russell
gave up expecting anything to happen ; he was
unutterably bored ; the heat remained merciless, and
he drew off most of his clothes and lay sweltering inside
the curtains. Eventually he sank to sleep.

“ I know not what my dreams were,” he wrote after-
wards, “but well I remember the waking.” The cause

» SOWAR 1 SOWAR 1”

358 ]

317

nd manner of his waking must be described in his
wn words : —

“ There was a confused clamour of shrieks and
houting in my ear. My dooly was raised from the
round and then let fall violently. I heard my bearers
houting, ‘Sowar! sowar!’ I saw them flying, with
;rror in their faces. All the camp-followers, in wild
onfusion, were rushing for the road. It was a
eritable stampede of men and animals. Elephants
^ere trumpeting shrilly as they thundered over the
elds, camels slung along at their utmost joggling
tride, horses and tats, women and children were ^1
ouring in a stream, which converged and tossed in
eaps of white as it neared the road — an awfiil panic.
Old, heavens above ! within a few yards _ of us,
weeping on like the wind, rushed a great billow of
^hite sowars, their sabres flashing in the sun, the roar
f their voices, the thunder of their horses filling and
baking the air. As they came on, camp-followers fell
ath cleft skulls and bleeding wounds upon the field ;
ae left wing of the wild cavalry was coming straight
jr the tope in which we lay. The eye takes in at a
lance what tongue cannot tell or hand write in an
our. Here was, it appeared, an inglorious miserable
eath swooping down on us in the heart of that yelling
rowd. At that instant my faithful syce, with drops of
weat rolling down his black face, ran towards me,
ragging my unwilling and plunging horse towards
le litter, and shouting to me as if in the greatest
ffliction. I could scarcely move in the dooly. I don’t
now how I ever managed to do it, but by the help of
oor Ramdeen I got into the saddle it felt like a
late of red-hot iron; all the flesh of the blistered
tiigh rolled off in a quid on the flap ; the leech bites
urst out afresh, the stirrup irons seemed like blazing
oals ; death itself could not be more full of pain. I
ad nothing on but my shirt. Feet and legs naked—
ead uncovered — ^with Ramdeen holding on by one
tirrup-leather, whilst with wild cries he urged on the
orse and struck him over the flanks with a long strip
f thorn— I flew across the plain under that awful sun.
was in a ruck of animals soon, and gave up all chance

3i8 ROHILKHAND campaign [Chap. XXV.

of life as a group of sowars rushed in among them.
Ramdeen gave a loud cry, with a look of terror over
his shoulder, and leaving the stirrup leather, dis-
appeared. I followed the direction of his glance, and
saw a black-bearded scoundrel, ahead of three sowars,
who was coining right at me. Just at that moment a
poor wretch of a camel driver, leading his beast by the
nose-string, rushed right across me, and seeing the
sowar so close darted under his camel’s belly. Quick
as thought the sowar reined his horse right round the
other side of the camel, and as the man rose, I saw the
flash of the tulwar falling on his head like a stroke of
lightning. It cleft through both his hands, which he
had crossed on his head, and with a feeble gurgle of
‘ Ram ! Ram I ’ the camel-driver fell close beside me
with his skull split to the nose. I felt my time was
come. My naked heels could make no impression on
the panting horse. 1 saw, indeed, a cloud of dust, and
a body of men advancing from the road ; but just at
that moment a pain so keen shot through my head that
my eyes flashed fire. My senses did not leave me ; I
knew quite well I was cut down, and put my hand up
to my head, but there was no blood ; for a moment a
pleasant dream of home came across me; I thought I
was in the hunting-field, that the heart of the pack was
all around me ; but I could not hold on my horse ; my
eyes swam, and I remember no more than that I had,
as it were, a delicious plunge into a deep cool lake, in
which I sank deep and deep, till the gurgling waters
rushed into my lungs and stifled me.

“ On recovering my senses I found myself in a dooly
by the roadside, but I thought what had passed was a
dream. I had been for a long time insensible. I tried
to speak, but my mouth was full of blood. Then I -was
seized with violent spasms in the lungs, from which
for more than an hour I coughed up quantities of
mucus and blood ; my head felt like a ball of molten
lead. It is only from others I gathered whi(t happened
this day, for my own recollections after the charge of
the cavalry are more vague than those of a sick man’s
night visions. I can remember a long halt in the dooly,
amidst an immense multitude of ammunition camels,
sick and wounded soldiers, and camp-followers. I

1858]

ALMOST DEAD

319

remember rows of doolies passing by to the rear, and
occasional volleys of musketry, and the firing of field
guns close at hand. It appears that I fell from my
horse close to the spot where Tombs’ guns were
unlimbering, and that a soldier who belonged to the
ammunition guard, and who was running from the
sowars, seeing a body lying in the sun all naked,
except a bloody shirt, sent out a dooly when he got to
the road for ‘a dead officer who had been, stript,’ and I
was taken up and carried off to the cover of some
trees. Alison and Baird saved themselves also ; but
they got well away before I could mount Baird’s
servant poured some brandy down my throat After
a long interval of pain and half-consciousness of life,
Simon came to me, chafed my legs and arms and
rubbed my chest My thirst was insatiable. The heat
from twelve o’clock to sunset was tremendous, and this
day all over India we lost literally hundreds of men
by sunstroke. ... No surgeon came near me, as well
as I can recollect, for several hours. The non-attendance
of my friends may have tended to save my life. As
soon as the flood of blood and mucus from the lungs
had somewhat ceased, Simon got me a bottle of vin
ordinaire, which I drank at a few gulps. My dooly
was recovered, and it was lucky I was not in it, for it
bore marks of a probing of a no friendly character by
lance and sword. . . . ^

“The sun was going down ere we were moved
forward for about half a mile, and there orl a bare,
sandy plain was one small tent pitched for Sir Colin,
and two or three pall and servants’ tents for the
officers. I was put into my own pall. Scarcely was I
placed in the charpoy ere Sir Colin came in, and
having heard what had happened, congratulated me on
the escape from the sun and sowar, and proceeded to
give me details of what had occurred He complained
very much of want of information. When he thought
he was outeide Bareilly he was in reality only outside
the ruined cantonments, some miles from the city
proper. The enemy were still in the city. They had
fallen back, and it was too late to pursue them or to
make an attempt to enter the place. The men were
quite exhausted. They had suffered fearfully from

320

ROHILKHAND CAMPAIGN [Chap. XXV.

sunstroke. . . . The doctors came in at last, Tice and
Mackinnon. They saw me— withdrew— consulted in
whispers. I can remember so well their figures as
they stood at the door of the pall, thrown into dark
shade by the blazing bivouac fires 1 No tents were
pitched ; the soldiers lay down in their blankets, or
without them on the sandy plain. The cavalry stretched
themselves by their horses, and the artillery lay among
their guns. Strong pickets and patrols were posted
all round the camp. Ere I went to sleep for the night
I was anointed with strong tincture of iodine. I never
knew till long afterwards that up to this moment one
lung had ceased to act at all, and that a portion of the
other was gorged from pulmonary apoplexy, brought
on by the sunstroke or heat ; and that m fact my two
friends had no expectation of my being alive next
morning. Such is my recollection and experience of
the Battle of Bareilly.”

The account which reached Mrs. Russell of this
episode was not very accurate, but it gave her plenty
of material for anxiety. Mr. J. C. MacDonald wrote
to her from the Times office : —

“My Dear Mrs. Russell, — I have just returned
from Sumner Place, where I went in hopes of catching
you before you left town. I wanted to tell you that
our Bombay correspondent sends us a few lines about
William’s health, which, though so far satisfactory as
indicating that the danger is over, give us all a good
deal of concern about him and the knowledge of which
we feel should not be withheld from you. It appears
that having been hurt by the kick of a horse, though not
seriously, he was accompanying the march of the
Army in a litter when the bearers, seized by some
sudden panic, bolted. Finding himself thus deserted
he made an effi>rt to get on horseback and succeeded,
but was subsequently so overcome by the intense heat
and exposure that for a short time he was considered
to be m great danger ; but, thank God, he had rallied
and there is every reason to believe that the next
mail will bring you tidings either of his entire
recovery or that he is on his way home to recruit

SUNSTROKE

321

1858]

after his arduous labours. His illness began on the
Sth of May, but beyond the foregoing facts, stated
with the saroe brevity as I give them, our Bombay
correspondent adds nothing. The news probably
reached him by telegraph, which will account for its
not being more detailed. I have only in conclusion to
beseech of you not to be unnecessarily alarmed or
anxious, but to bear in mind that the critical period of
his illness was stated to be over, that he is quite certain
to receive every possible care, and that this illness
will no doubt make it necessary for him to go to the
Hills, which are at no great distance, or to come home,
which I dare say would be much more satisfactory to
you, to recruit Anyhow, he will be relieved from
the risks to health of a hot weather campaign,
and compelled to make his own recovery the first
consideration. I am so sorry not to have had the
opportunity of personally reassuring and comforting
you about this news, which I yet felt that it would be
quite improper in the least degree to withhold from
you. Trusting most sincerely that your good sense
and courage will protect you from giving way to
apprehensions which can do no good, and are not
justified by the facts so far as I know them, I am, my
dear Mrs. Russell,

“ Always yours very sincerely,

“John C. MacDonald.”

It may be imagined chat Russell was now worse off
than ever; in addition to the blister and the leeches
he must bear with iodine. He took such consolation
as he could from the assiurance of the doctors that if
be had not been so weakened from all the bleeding
and dosing he would undoubtedly have died from the
sunstroke. In this state he went on with the Army,
lying inside his swaying dooly, sometimes in a stupor
from exhaustion and the heat During these days he
employed amanuenses — ^generally honest, stiff-fingered
corporals. Once when he was about to pay one of
them the man said, “ No, Mr. Russell, there is not a

R. — VOL. I.

322 ROHILKHAND CAMPAIGN [Chap. XXV.

man in the regiment who was out in the Crimea
would take a penny from you, sir. You were the
true soldiers’ friend” — one of the best if simplest
compliments Russell ever received in his life.

Probably the most anxious time he had after leaving
Bareilly was during the march to Fatehgarh. Strict
orders had been given for all the doolies to be
kept in the rear of the main body, where they
were naturally smothered with dust. One of the
occupants of the doolies who made some remark
to General Mansfield about the straggling of the
Beluchis, and the danger to baggage and sick in case
of an attack, was told sardonically that, “ it often
happens on occasions of this sort that baggage and
sick must be abandoned to the enemy.” “ And such an
enemy I ” writes the sick Russell gloomily in his diary.

At Fatehgarh he had a few days of delightful rest
Meanwhile he collected information about events
outside his own cognizance, and he bursts out in his
diary with indignation at some of the stories which
were told to him of unnecessary reprisals. He had by
this time received a great amount of evidence as to the
appalling brutalities of the Sepoys— English women
blown from guns and children set up against the
targets to be fired at on the practice grounds. If he
had gathered very little or no evidence of the popular
stories of mutilation, there were enough undis-
puted facts of cold-blooded massacre to stagger the
imagination. One had not to look far in Fatehgarh
itself for evidence. But Russell in all his letters,
public and private, had in effect one comment to make.

“ These were acts of barbarous savages. Were our
acts those of civilised Christians ? ”

He would not palter for a moment with the

CHIVALROUS IDEALS

323

18S8]

argument that the provocation was intolerable, or that
excess must be met by excess — or even by exceptional
severity. “ If a Christian nation wages war at all,”
he always seemed to be saying, “ it must fight in an
unfalteringly Christian way. You say that it will
then fight at a hopeless disadvantage ? So be it.
Even that duty is laid upon us.”

Russell was on sure ground in condemning the
exceptional punishments of those times which forced
natives to be the passive agents in the degradation of
their creeds. But it was not to be expected that
the officers of the tiny columns which with gallant
desperation fought their way through districts filled
with an exultant and fanatical foe would accept — still
less would the friends of dead officers accept — as
justifiable, the argument that these columns could
have emerged from their unparalleled trials without
striking terror into the hearts of the mutineers. If it
be said that he accused the bulk of the British officers
and officials in India with ferocity, the assertion is as
untrue as the charge would have been. He did
charge, and justly charge, a small minority with
advocating and practising measures of revenge which
nothing could justify and only a temporary loss of
judgment and self-possession could explain. But the
journalist is peculiarly liable to misunderstanding;
his readers confuse the particular with the general,
and jump to rash conclusions on the strength of one
article which would be safely dissipated if they read
the next Probably Russell was careless of gpiarding
himself against misunderstanding ; quick indignation,
generous impetuosity, intolerance of casuistry, reck-
less disposal of his personal popularity — all these
things were part of his strong Irish temperament

324 ROHILKHAND CAMPAIGN [Chap. XXV.

Fortunately in a letter which has been preserved
Russell discusses this very matter. Mr. Sherer was
widely known as a temperate, wise, and just man, and
it is clear that he thought Russell had laid himself
open to misunderstanding.

“If ever a plain man,” Russell wrote to him, “was
undone by plain writing it is I. Here are you, mine own
familiar friend, refusing to see the difference between
a particular and a universal, and joining in the cry
that I have traduced my countrymen in India. To be
precise, you say I have overdone the cruelty treatment
part. Now, my dear Sherer, as I write to you as
familiarly and kindly as though I had known you from
boyhood, let me first assure you that there is nothing
so much obliges me as the honest expression of a
man’s opinion respecting my own or those I express ;
there is nothing I deprecate so much as the cruelty
and uncharitableness of silence on the part of one’s
friends who think ‘Russell is wrong’ and yet will
not say so to me as you have done. So I am neither
in wrath nor grief at your telling me what you thin}c of
my views, and you at once make me look back to my
writings to see if there is anything which could be
fairly taken to imply that generally the English in
India are cruel and treat the natives badly. Here I
in some measure join issue with you in the inter-
pretation you have placed on my writings. I have
most sedulously guarded, as far as words could do,
against any imputation of the kind referred to. On
the contrary, I nave described the party alluded to in
ail instances as a base and brutal minority, whilst I
have deplored the absence of a public opinion which
could make itself heard in reference to their acts, and
so control and coerce them. I have most distinctly
stated that the servants of the Company have stood
between the natives and the instincts which make the
white man wage war in looks and acts against him
of the rete mucosum; that they have protected the
Hindoo against the adventurer who would exploit
India as the Yankee backwoodsman would enter on a
red man’s land in the far west, and would, if he could,
suppress the aborigines. I tried to direct public

A CHALLENGE

32s

18S8]

opinion at home, failing any expression of it in Indi^
against the Dantons and St. Justs who, riding their
bloody hobbies, with the war cries of ‘Sepoy atrocity ’
and ‘white pandies,’ sought to break through the
barriers of truth and justice, and were the very Don
Quixotes of cruelty, revenge and lust of blood. I am
open to admit the existence of great and tremendous
provocations of these evil passions, but I ask what is
the use of a superior civilisation, and_ of Christianity
itself, if we are to yield to these incitements ? You
say rightly that the manners of the natives are almost
as bad as our own, but my John, think of the difference
of position between the two races.”

To this Mr. Sherer replied (May 30th, 1858) : —

“Now about misunderstanding you. I will give in
for a season. We are unaccustomed to criticism in
this countrVj and sensitive people find meanings
in words which they were never intended to convey.
If you find when you get home that the impression of
your meaning is not the same in England as it is out
here, I will admit we have misunderstood you and
without reasonable excuse. If, on the contrary, you
find that you have been misunderstood in England,
then, I think you must admit that in this one instance
the pen of Russell has not succeeded so well as in
many others, in doing what it is its great fame to_ do
in an unmatched manner — ^viz., to produce in the mind
of the reader the exact impression which was in the
mind of the writer. ... I join in no cry, and have
a profound contempt for the Indian Press and its
productions.

“A feeble but a desperate pack
With each a sickly brother at his back ;

Sons of a day just buoyant on the flood,

Then numbered with the puppies in the mud.

Ask ye their names? I could as soon disclose
The names of these blind puppies as of those.”

CHAPTER XXVI

IN THE HILLS

On June 3rd Russell left Fatehgarh for Simla,
where he had decided to rest and re-gather his
strength during the suspension of the military opera-
tions. On his way he stayed for a short time at
Delhi. Here he was allowed to go to the palace to
see the King of Delhi, whom he found sick and in
pain — altogether a feeble and miserable old man.
Brigadier Stisted, who accompanied Russell, asked
the king why he had not saved the lives of the English
women, and the old man, making an impatient gesture
as though to command silence, said, " I know nothing
of it— I had nothing to say to it.” The visitors spoke
to the latest of the Begums, who, however, remained
inside her curtains so that they did not see her face.
She seemed to be impatient with the feeble old king,
and said, “ Why, the old fool ” (thus was the word
translated) “goes on as if he were still king ; he’s no
king now, and I want to go away from him.” Russell
was inclined to believe that from the beginning of the
Mutiny the king had very little power over the Sepoys.
For some days he kept the English women unharmed
in the palace, but he did not take the precaution of
putting them in his zenana, which would have saved
their lives. Perhaps he did not dare to do that;
Russell guessed from what he saw that the old man
was afraid of his womenfolL However that may be,
the massacre of the English women took place in the

LINK WITH THE PAST

527

18S8]

palace. While staying at Delhi, Russell remarked in
his diary that the Mohammedan element in India was
that which everywhere caused most trouble to British
rule, perhaps because the memory of glorious days
was less faded than in the Hindus. Fifty years later
the exact reverse is true.

On arriving at Simla, Russell went to the Club,
where, however, he had been only an hour or two
when Lord William Hay* came in and invited him to
dine that night, and put up in his house till he could
find quarters of his own. The invitation was gladly
accepted. In Lord William Hay’s household there
was an old man named Jumen, who acted as a
factotum. He had actually served under Lord Lake,
and was able to prove the fact by producing a
certificate and discharge. Russell used to look with
a kind of awe on the face of one who had taken part
in our early history in India, when we were still
fighting against Scindia and Holkar, against French-
men and Mahratta — before Rohilkhand had been
conquered and Oudh had become a kingdom. And
yet this old man’s father was alive I

In a few days Russell and Captain Alison hired a
house to live in, and Russell used to sit in the verandah
most of the day gazing upon the Snowy Range. He
still moved slowly and with difficulty on crutches.
At this time he received the following letter from
Delane : —

May %th,

“ My Dear Russell, — In spite of heat and dust and
some beer and bad brandy, you have done so admirably
well that everyone admits your story of Lucknow
equals the very best of your Crimean achievements.

* The present Lord Tweeddale. He was then Deputy-Commis-
sioner of Simla, and Superintendent of Hill States, Northern India,

328

IN THE HILLS [Chap. XXVI.

It has been fully appreciated, and you have not, as
you had in the Crimea, a lar^e party interested in
running you down and contradicting you. One effect
of your last letter, however, has been what is tanta-
mount to the recall of Canning. The proclamation
you enclosed for the annexation of the soil of Oude
has been severely censured by Ellenborough, and
either by design or inadvertence, the dispatch con-
taining the censure has been allowed to ooze out, so
that Canning can scarcely submit to affront. We had
a smart debate on the affair last night which will, I
hope, reach you. I shall not be surprised if the
immediate result here is a vote of ‘ no confidence ’ in
the Government, which would turn the tables again
in favour of Canning. In the event of his coming
away, Sir John Lawrence will be Governor-General
for the time. Pray draw £io on my account and carry
it all in gold about you when you next accompany a
storming party. To think that you got nothing out
of the Kaiserbagh for the want of a few rupees 1 . . .

“ Pray remember me to Outram if you see him
again. I rejoice greatly in his success, as I had a
large share in lifting him out of the mud three or four
years since, and had to encounter the malevolence
of many who were masters in the art of depreciation.

“ I hope you will be out of Lucknow long before
this reaches you, and in some cool and pleasant place
whence you can write with satisfaction.

“With best wishes, I am ever, my dear Russell, very
faithfully yours,

“J. T. D.”

Two or three times Russell was visited by Mr. W. D.
Arnold, Director of Public Instruction in the Punjab.
He was the eldest son of Arnold, of Rugby, and the
author of “ Oakfield,” a novel written to improve the
tone of military society as he knew it. He had , done
much to support the policy of Sir John Lawrence
A year after his meeting with Russell he died at
Gibraltar on his way home. He is commemorated
by his brother, Matthew Arnold, in “Stanzas from

W. D. ARNOLD

329

18S8J

Camac,” and in that exquisitely beautiful poem, “ A
Southern Night.” After his visits to Russell he
wrote (August 2nd, 1858) : —

“I do confess myself deeply anxious for the truth
to be spoken about Sir John Lawrence — for the
country’s sake rather than for his own. I need not,
to you I trust, descend to a vindication of myself
from any feeling of personal dependence on Sir John.
For that matter I consider myself in our Punjab
district Sir Henry’s bucha, not Sir John’s. But you"
spoke to me once of ‘ political damnation,’ and if there
be any truth in Thomas Carlyle, no sign of damnation
is more sure than when a nation refuses to honour its

g reat men. That John Lawrence has saved the Indian
mpire, I feel as absolutely certain as of any fact in
the world. There is not a man whose life and honour
were saved to him in 1857, who does not feel the same

E erfect conviction which nothing can shake, and, this
eing so, it will be an evil day for England if such a
man is rewarded with slander ; if the most conspicuous
deeds, the most unanimous testimony of all well-
informed witnesses, are found powerless before the
whispers of drawing-rooms, the good-natured lies

of , preferring with a true aristocratic instinct his

friend to his country. That you will in great measure
avert this calamity is my earnest hope.’’'

One day Russell went to see the Lawrence Asylum
at Kasauli, and learned with much satisfaction that
the Government had resolved to act on the generous
idea of Henry Lawrence and make the asylum a
national institution. In describing his visit, Russell
bursts into one of those ungrudging appreciations
which were as characteristic of him as his promptitude
to blame hotly when his indignation was moved.

“What a grand heroic mould that mind was cast
in!” he writes of Henry Lawrence. “What a pure
type of the Christian soldier! From what I have
heard of him, of his natural infirmities, of his immense
efforts to overcome them ; of his purity of thought ;

330

IN THE HILLS [Chap. XXVL

of his charity, of his love, of the virtues which his
inner life developed as he advanced in years ; of his
devotion to duty, to friendship, and to Heaven; I
am led to think that no such exemplar of a truly good
man can be found in the ranks of the servants of any
Christian State in the latter ages of this world.”*

A few pages later in his diary Russell goes on to
assert the principle of trusteeship which he considered
should guide every member of the ruling race in India
He had no notion that the obligations of personal
example could be discharged only by officials.

“I think that every Englishman in India ought to
look upon himself as a sort of unrecognised, unpaid
servant of the State, on whose conduct and demeanour
towards the natives may depend some of the political
prestige of our rule in the whole Empire. He is
hound to keep the peace, to obey the law, to maintain
order and good government. In the hill stations he
certainly does not exhibit any strong inclination to
adopt this view of his, position.”

Russell continually busied himself with these
thoughts ; he could not take part in a merry evening
at mess, when singing and drinking were in full swing
— accomplished as he was himself in all the arts of
conviviality — without wondering what those silent
natives, standing with fixed eyes and folded arms
behind the chairs of their masters, were thinking of
it all. It is not difficult to trace in his thoughts the
influence of W. D. Arnold.

About this time he received a letter in which Sir
James Outram corrected a statement made in one of
the letters to the Times. The statement which was

• Lord Morley of Blackburn, in one of his Indian speeches, has
recorded the saying that no man ever rose from Henry Lawence’s
table without having learned to think more Jtindly of the natives.

OUTRAM

i8s8]

331

published on June 7th, 1858, referred to the relief of
Lucknow and was as follows : —

“ But it is certain that here the grave error was
committed (by Sir J. Outram) of hurrying Sir Colin
Campbell’s advance by representations respecting the
state of the supplies and the means of holding out,
which were, to say the least, unfortunate. If Sir Colin
Campbell could have had more time to collect troops,
the garrison might have been relieved, and the city of
Lucknow held without any danger to Cawnpore ; but
Sir James Outram was led to believe that the supplies
would only last to a certain date. Sir Colin acted on
the statement which was made to him, and, anxious to
save women and children, advanced at once, and barely
succeeded in saving Cawnpore and Lucknow both.”

Outram wrote : —

“Calcutta,

27th, 1858.

“ My Dear Russell, — I write in a hurry to save the
post On myself reading the most kind and flattering
mention you make of me in your letter to the Times of
the 1 8th April, I was too much gratified to observe a
slight mistake into which you had fallen, but which
has since been brought to my notice You will find
the extract on the other side, also copy of a letter I
sent to Cawnpore about ten days before Sir Colin
left, which will show you that, however anxious I
was for relief, I was more anxious that the Gwalior
rebels should first be disposed of from the moment
I learnt that they were threatening Cawnpore. I
certainly was much deceived as to the quantity of
grain, but there was no doubt the few remaining gun-
bullocks would not suffice, and I was fully prepared to
eke out the time by eating up our starving norses.

“ I have had much anxiety about you on hearing of
your sunstroke, and it was a great relief to me to hear
that you had gone to Simla; what a narrow escape
you had from the Ghazees 1 Baird told me all about
It I went lately to Galle, having myself had some
threatening symptoms which induced me to take a
short sea trip. I have often wished to write to you,
but my abominable habit of procrastination has always

332

IN THE HILLS [Chap. XXVI.

caused me to put off ‘ till to-morrow,’ and now I have
only time for this hasty chit. I trust you received
my farewell letter in acknowledgment of yours, the
most gratifying letter I ever received from anyone,
otherwise you must have thought me exceedingly
ungrateful.

“ Ever most sincerely yours,

“J. OUTRAM.”

The extract from Outram’s letter (dated Lucknow
Residency, October 28th, 1857), to Captain Bruce at
Cawnpore was as follows ; —

“I shall not detain Canojee (the cossid*) beyond
to-night, being anxious to prevent the force being
hurried from Cawnpore to Alum Bagh. The latter
post having now been amply supplied with food, and
sufficiently strengthened to defy attack, is no longer
a source of anxiety ; and however desirable it may be
to support me here, I cannot but feel that it is still
more important that the Gwalior rebels (said to be
preparing to cross into the Doab) should be first
disposed of. I should therefore urge on Brigadier
Wilson, to whom I beg you will communicate this as
if addressed to himself, that I consider that the Delhi
column, strengthened to the utmost by all other troops
that can be spared from Cawnpore, should in the first
instance be employed against the Gwalior rebels should
they attempt to cross mto the Doab, or be tangible to
assault elsewhere within reasonable distance. We
can manage to screw on, if absolutely necessary, till
near the end of November on further reduced rations,
Only, the longer we remain, the less physical strength
we shall have to aid our friends with when they do
advance, and the fewer guns shall we be able to move
out in co-operation.

“ But it is so obviously to the advantage of the
State, that the Gwalior rebels should be first effectually
destroyed, that our relief should be a secondary con-
sideration. I trust, therefore, that Brigadier Wilson
will furnish Colonel Grant with every possible aid to
effect that object before sending him here.”

* A cossid is a courier.

1858 ]

DICKENS

333

Outram added in a postscript that as this message to
Bruce was received on October 30th, there could be no
doubt that it was communicated to Colin Campbell, who
did not leave Cawnpore for Lucknow till November gth.

A few days later the following letter came from
Charles Dickens : —

“ Gad’s Hill Place,

“High AM by Rochester,

“ Wednesday Evening, July yth, 1858.

“ My Dear Russell, — I cannot let another mail go
from Marseilles, without sending you my hearty and
cordial word of thanks for your great kindness about
my boy, and without saying to you (which is most
superfluous) with what unspeakable pleasure I shall
see you at home agaiiL I write from the top of that
hill where I did hope to have seen you long ago, and
where I have a propnetic assurance and fore£iowledge
that I shall see you and Mrs. Russell many a time.
Divers wonderful drinks are in the capital cellar in
the chalk below, which I reserve for these occasions.
And I shall tell you all that I leave out of this letter —
so prepare and resign yourself— there being nothing
in this letter. Heavens I how long-winded I shall
have to be I

“No doubt by some wonderful means or other, you
get all the news from Printing House Square, at about
the same time as I get it here. How the Atlantic
telegraph wire broke again, the day before yesterday
or so, you know, of course. Also, how your friend
reads his shorter books in public (Arthur Smith,
manager) with a success which his modesty forbids
him to expatiate upon. Also, how he has asked
Mrs. Russell as a guest to such intellectual banquet —
who came, he hopes. Also, how Albert Smith starts
for Hong Kong, via Marseilles, to-morrow night, a
hot and weary journey for a man of his figure ; as an
improvement of which I have recommended Sheridan’s
advice as to saying he saw it, and not putting himself
out of the way to go to see it. . . .

“ Everybody talks about your letters, and eveiy-
body praises them. No one says, or can say, more of

334

IN THE HILLS [Chap. XXVI.

them than they deserve. I have been deeply impressed
by your suggestion, in your note to me, of the miseries
and horrors by which you are surrounded ; and I can
well understand what a trial the whole frightful,
revengeful business must be to an affectionate and
earnest man. Are there good chances of its so far
being ended, as to enable you to come home? That
is the turning-point in the War, that I (and Mrs.
Russell) think most about.

“The gentleman to whom you gave a letter of
introduction, called on me one afternoon last month,
and left word that he was going away directly. I
called on him next day. He was out, as I had been ;
but I saw a very good serving man who told how he
was ‘ joost awa’ into Scotland yon, airily the morrow
mornin’,’ so I left him my card, with an intimation
that I hoped to know him better on his return.

“The Garrick is in convulsions. The attack is
consequent on Thackeray’s having complained to the
committee (with an amazing want of discretion, as I
think) of an article about him by Edmund Yates, in
a thing called Town Talk. The article is in bad taste,
no doubt, and would have been infinitely better left
alone But I conceive that the committee have nothing
earthly, celestial, or infernal to do with it. Committee
thinks otherwise, and calls on E. Y. to apologise or
retire. E. Y.. can’t apologise (Thackeray having written
him a letter which renders it impossible), and won’t
retire. Committee thereupon call a General Meeting,
yet pending. Thackeray thereupon, by way of showing
what an ill thing it is for writers to attack one another
in print, denounced E. Y. (in ‘ Virginians ’ as ‘ Young
Grub Street ’). Frightful mess, muddle, complication,
and botheration, ensue — which witch’s broth is now
in full boil. Why, you are better with a turban round
your hat over there, than here, with all this nonsense
going on! As to me, I have come to the blessed
woods and fields to forget several things (you are not
among them, dear Russell) and to calm down before
I go a-reading God knows where — including Dublin,
Cork, Belfast, and Limerick. I have never set foot in
Ireland before.

“Behold all my news, and the end of my paper!

INDIA REVEALED

335

1858 ]

I send you a cordial and vigorous shake of my hand
with my heart in it— which was the way in which
Rogers’s Ginevra (or someone else) gave hers to her
lover — and a very pretty and loving way too.

“ Where is your old map this night I wonder, and
the wand you used to point with ? Lord, Lord ! And
Joe Robins playing (with indifferent success, I am
afraid) far North I! And Delane looking as if he
lived on morning dew and horseback!! I God bless
you, and send you back to us, ruddy and bould.

“ Believe me ever heartily and aiiectionately yours,

“ Charles Dickens.”

At the same time Delane wrote : —

‘'July Zth, 1858 .

“ My Dear Russell, — There was not only among
your friends, but throughout the whole circle of the
newspaper-reading public, but one sensation of relief
when we got the news, that in spite of kick and sun-
stroke and dysentery, you are all well again and able
to give such convincing proof of your recovered vigour
as the series of letters up to Futtehghur. I trust that
long before this you are up in some cool place busy
with trout and pheasants, instead of Pandies and
Sikhs, and getting health and strength enough to start
fair next S^tember. I sincerely believe the loss of
old Colin Campbell would have been considered a
trifle in comparison with the public misfortune of your
being invalided. . . .

“ It is of no use calling for other armies from Eng-
land. We have not got them to send, and if we had
should grudge them for India until your generals learn
to take care of them with common sense and common
humanity. You will have seen, I hope, how I have
backed every one of your suggestions by leading
articles. Happily, you have everybody on your side
and no enemy, as in the Crimea, to deny or hint denial
of eveiy fact Everybody, too, says, and with perfect
truth, that it is you who have first made India known
to us, described its aspect and its peculiarities, so that
we have before our eyes at last the scene of so many
exploits and reverses.

“ At a repetition of the Windsor picnic of last year.

336

IN THE HILLS [Chap. XXVI.

at which you assisted, we all drank your health, if not
with three times three cheers, with twice as many
good wishes. . . . Tell us something about yourself in
your next private letter. You are at least as interest-
ing as India to all of us.

“With kindest good wishes, I am ever, my dear
Russell, yours very faithfully,

“J. T. D.”

A few days later a letter came from Mowbray
Morris ; —

“ Printing House Square, E.C.,

17th July, 1858.

“My Dear Russell, — I have received your mem.
for April, for which thanks. I have read with mingled
pain and pleasure your interesting account of your
own personal adventures, your dangers and escapes.
If this can console you at all for much labour and
suffering, pray be assured that every one here follows
your course with the utmost interest and sympathy ;
and I believe the feeling is shared by several persons
outside our own little republic — perhaps by all, except
the Horse Guards. Soldiers of tne old military aristo-
cratic school would, no doubt, hear of your utter
destruction with perfect composure, as they have heard
of your temporary obscuration with undisguised satis-
faction ; but people generally are heartily sorry for
you, and appreciate, as we do, your devotion to the
Times and your disregard of comfort and even danger
in the discharge of duty. For my own part, I shall be
heartily glad when the cessation of active hostilities
relieves you from a perilous task which is a source of
much anxiety to all your friends.

“ You promise to tell the truth about India I do
hope you will- — the whole truth, without fear, favour or
affection. My knowledge of the subject is so imperfect
that I hardly venture to form, and still less to express,
an opinion ; but I cannot suppress some misgivings as
to the line taken by the Times. In the first place, 1 am
disposed to think that Lord Canning’s policy will not
be found to have deserved the thick-and-thin support
it has received from us. However disagreeable a
mail’s manners may be, they will be forgotten in the

NUTS TO CRACK

337

i8s8]

midst of a perilous crisis where his measures are good.
How is it that a whole community not only disapprove
his policy but absolutely detest his very name? I
know that the whole feeling is attributed to an
infuriated Press, smarting under what was to many
confiscation and to all degradation. That answer does
not satisfy me. There are some among my own private
correspondents who have no sympathy for the Press,
but who believe the Press is right in condemning Lord
Canning.

“ Again, I have my doubts about the policy of dis-
turbing the machinery of the Government at such a
time as this. It is true that the Bill, as it stands, leaves
things pretty much as they were, and that the change
is more in name than in things. But the discussion
and agitation must have produced bad effects in India,
and it is very questionable whether the substitution of
the Queen’s for the Company’s name as the supreme
authority will not produce the very reverse of our
expectations. It was not the Company whom the
native regarded as the type of absolute power, but the
Governor-General. His authority, in all probability,
has been weakened at the time when it should have
been strengthened by every means in our power.

“ However, these matters are of Imperial concern,
and can be argued as well here as at Calcutta. What
you can tell is the actual state of affairs. Has the local
administration been generally conducted in a way to
conciliate the natives and give them confidence in our
justice ? Has our rule presented a favourable contrast
to that of the native princes, and have the material
interests of the masses been better cared for than by
them ? These seem to be the questions that require
an honest answer. I say an honest answer, because
ail that we at home know about the matter has been
supplied by interested persons, and probably by the
very persons whose characters are involyed in the
inquiry. And, lastly, there is the question of the
Indian Army, its organisation, its discipline, and its
distribution.

“ Here are nuts for you to crack — matters for
speculation in the weary hours of inaction. I hope
you will find in them enough occupation to dissipate

R. — ^VOL. I. z

338 IN THE HILLS [Chap. XXVI.

ennui and to lure your thoughts from personal dis-
agreeables.

“ Believe me, my dear Russell,

“ Very truly yours,

“Mowbray Morris.”

Another letter was from Kavanagh, the hero of the
daring exploit at Lucknow, which has already been
mentioned He wrote from a place sixteen miles west
of Lucknow, where he had civil charge of a district

“ I have a grievance which I hope you will think is
not an unfounded one, and in the relief of which I
crave the use of your powerful pen. The Court of
Directors have expressed ‘their deep sense of the
courage displayed and the signal services rendered by
him during the siege of Lucknow,’ but add that they
are ‘precluded by the terms of the Statutes of the
Order of the Victoria Cross, which are confined to
members of the Military and Naval professions,
from taking any steps for submitting to the proper
authorities Mr. Kavanagh’s wish for that honorary
distinction.’*

“I cannot express the regret and disappointment
this coolness of the Court has caused me. They see
nothing extraordinary in my having risked my life and
the welfare of a large family, not from mere bravado,
but to perform a great public service by which the
lives of several of our fine soldiers were saved. They
see nothing uncommon in an act of individual daring
which for danger and advantages to the State has not
been equalled during this war. They see nothing in
a feat which Sir Colin has pronounced ‘the most
daring thing ever attempted,’ and that in behalf of the
interests of the Company t — ^no I d them, not for

* The Victoria Cross warrant was altered so as to include civilians,
and Kavanagh was decorated with the Cross by the Queen at
Windsor on January 4th, i860.

t It may be pointed out here that Kavanagh was of Irish descent,
through both his father and mother. It is a mistake to say, as
has been ' said in at least one book, that he was a Eurasian.
His deed would have been less daring if his skin had not been
white. He was an uncovenanted Civil servant in Oudh. The
phrase, “ no I d them, not for them — of Great Britam,” will,

KAVANAGH

339

i8s8]

them — of Great Britain. If they had had the smallest
spark of British spirit in them, they would haye backed
Lord Canning’s recommendation and left it to the
Queen’s Government for decision. At the time those
Statutes were formed it was not understood, I know,
by the framers of them that the Cross was not to be
given to civilians for military services. The thought
could not have occurred to them that a time would
come when one of that body of public serv^ts would
merit it more than any of the military service. What
diflSculty is there in extending the operations of the
Warrant to persons who distinguish themselves in the
performance of military duties? I earned it in the
performance of a great military duty, for which no one
else in the garrison of Lucknow would have volun-
teered. It breaks my heart to have to plead for a thing
which ought at once to have been given to me without
the asking. I have all along felt sure of some perma-
nent mark of the Queen’s favour, which I might point
to in the honest pride of my heart as having earned it
in her cause — something to mark me as the man who
dared do anything to save our countrymen and punish
our foes, humble as I was. Alas 1 it is veiy sad to be
in the service of such wretched red-tape, spiritless, old
women. But I’ll not let the matter drop, and the old
fellows shall hear of me once more. I again beg your
help to get this wish — this very reasonable wish — of
mine gratified.”

A few days later (August i8th) Kavanagh wrote
again : —

“ My Dear Russell, — When I wrote to you on the
8th inst. the rebels were collecting at Sundeela to

perhaps, be accepted as less inappropriate from an Irishman than
from a Eurasian. One who had every opportunity of under-
standing Kavanagh’s character writes ; “ Those who were acquainted
with him intimately knew there was no man more generous in his
acknowledgment of heroism or honourable dealing in his fellow-men,
or who felt more bitterly neglect or the absence of adequate recogni-
tion of meritorious service. This will explain the expression, and I
think it would only be just to the memory of a distinguished man to
say so.” The reader observe that, with a primitive simplicity,
Kavanagh saw no reason for regarding the neglect of his own de^
as a less suitable subject of complaint than neglect of the services
of others.

340

IN THE HILLS [Chap. XXVI.

attack Mahomedabad again. On the loth I went out
to the latter place to see the Talookdars and Zemeen-
dars, who were invited to meet me there, and the time
being propitious, Dawson consented to go on to
Sundeela, and the following morning we started with
500 men of the Oude Military Police and 50 Sowars.
The enemy were reported to be 1,500 strong with 40
Sowars and five guns. When we reached half-way I got
a letter from a friendly Talookdar, warning me of rein-
forcements having reached Sundeela during the night,
which made the enemy 3,000 strong, with 500 cavalry.
We deliberated for a while and decided that there
were only so many more of them to run away. The
friendly Talookdar offered to attack the enemy with
his two guns and 250 Mussulmanee men from the
west as soon as he could reach Sundeela. In a few
minutes we were in sight of the enemy’s cavalry
picquet, and large bodies of cavalry were visible in
our front and on our left flank. Dawson gave me our
50 Sowars, and I soon sent their picquet scampering
back.

“Within a mile of Sundeela we arranged our plan of
attack. Dawson went in advance into the town while
I covered his left flank with the cavalry. When the
enemy’s cavalry saw our forward movement they
gathered in front of a tope to attack us. I turned on
them and galloped as if to charge them, and they
retired into the tope. I guarded Dawson’s flank till I
saw him going into the town at full trot under a fire
from the enemy’s guns, and then my Sowars (fifty) did
what few cavalrymen in India would have attempted —
we went straight at the 500 Sowars (mutineers) as
hard as we coiud go. The cowards turned and fled in
an instant, and it was only by riding at the utmost
speed that I overtook the rear. We dismounted about
thirty of them, when unfortunately my horse was shot
in the leg, and the men stopped in the pursuit to assist
me. We could not overtake them again. 1 rode round
the town and joined Dawson about 10 o’clock and was
delighted to find that he had captured their best gun.
He had had some hard work, for he had twelve men
killed and sixteen wounded, three of whom have died
since. He is a most gallant fellow. He had cleared

KAVANAGH

341

1858]

out all but one house, where twenty-six rebels, unable
to escape, had taken refuge. As I know something of
gunnery I brought our captured gun to bear on the
fellows, who were in the upper storey, and three
excellent shots through the door, at 200 yards, made
them cry out for mercy, which I gave them — a promise
to spare their lives. . . . Mr. Montgomery is highly
pleased with my success, and has pronounced the aifair
at Sundeela to be the most spirited thing which has
happened. We have proved, long before the expected
time, that the new police corps may be trusted,
and that they will attempt anything under proper
leaders. . . .

“ The weather here is most pleasant, and now that I
have ample employment for both body and mind, I am
cheerful and hearty myself. I went into Lucknow for
a couple of days and came back with a heart brimful of
joy, and charity towards all men.

“ If you help me in the matter of the V.C., and I can
get home next summer, I shall have it in spite of the
Court of Directors. ril_ never rest till the Queen’s
Government refuses or gives it to me. I have earned
it several times, and that charge with 50 Sowars
against 500 of our mutinous irregular cavalry, alone
would have got it for a military man. Why can’t they
make me a soldier and give me the Cross ?

“ Yours very faithfully,

“ Henry Kavanagh.”

CHAPTER XXVII

THE QUEEN’S PROCLAMATION

Day slipped into day, and Russell was making rapid
progress towards recovery. In September he was
well enough to go with Lord William Hay and others
on a shooting expedition. While on this expedition
he received a letter from Delane, who said

“We have had some sharp controversy here on
behalf of old Colin Campbell, now Lord Clyde, whom
‘ Disabled Officer ’ has accused of the most perverse
and ostentatious incompetence. He had a good deal
to say for his charge, but we took the C.C.’s part here
sincerely, and he ought to be well pleased. You will
have heard before this that the Company is at last
actually defunct and that Lawrence is on hiis way
home to be a member of the new India Council.^ But
you will scarcely believe in India that the favourite for
the new Governor-Generalship is Disraeli. I don’t
say that the party will venture to second him; it
would be a very bold step ; but it is quite on the cards.
He wants the money and the high station, and they
want to get rid of him here. He has done so well
during the last Session as to have conciliated much
opposition, and the country is so apathetic that it is
not likely there would be any great outcry against the
appointment. In the meantime Stanley is a very good
Indian Minister, and follows very obediently all the
good advice you give him. I send him extracts from
your private letters and always see an immediate
result It was your first private letter from Cawn-
pore which led to the order against indiscriminate
executions.”

On October 6th, thoroughly restored to health,
Russell left Simla on his way to rejoin Lord Clyde for
the renewed military operations. ^

RAJAH OF PATIALA

343

1858]

When passing through Umballa on his way south,
he received an invitation to visit the Rajah of Patiala.
For this purpose he had to drive eighteen miles to the
Rajah’s palace. He was accompanied by Mr. Melville,
the Deputy Commissioner of Umballa and an officer
on the Staff. When they had gone a good way along
the road they saw a cloud of dust ahead, and Mr.
Melville said, “There is the Rajah. He has come a
long way out to meet us.” Russell knew enough of
Eastern custom to be aware that the distance a
potentate travels from his palace to meet a guest is in
proportion to the respect he wishes to pay him, but he
assumed that the Rajah was thus courteous in honour
of Mr. Melville. He was soon to be undeceived. The
two parties met. The Rajah’s company was brilliant
with banners and diverse colours, and the Rajah
himself, encrusted with jewels, flashed with prismatic
colours in the sun. An elephant with an empty howdah
had been brought for the visitors, and as Russell toiled
up the ladder of this particularly tall pachyderm in the
heat and dust, he confessed to himself a wish that the
Rajah had not been kind enough to receive him, and
that he was clambering up to get a drink instead
of a glimpse of the exalted countenance which was
awaiting him in the howdah of another elephant
drawn up alongside. When he reached the top a
new trouble awaited him. He was requested to step
across to the Rajah’s howdah and take the place of
honour on the Rajah’s right hand. In vain he
pleaded with Mr. Melville by words and signs,
“Pray don’t ask me. You go.” “No, the Rajah
requests you will, and as this visit is from you, there
is no option but to obey. Will you be good enough
to step across ? ”

344

THE PROCLAMATION [Chap. XXVII.

“Across what?” continues the diary — "a chasm of
uncertain and varying breadth, full fifteen feet deep I
There is no beast so mobile as an elephant. Flies vex
him, mahouts persecute him ; eppur si muove — he is
never at rest. There sat his Highness the Rajah, and
here stood his lowness the correspondent, claudo pede^
afraid, by reason of his lameness, to make a leap ; and
the bulging sides of the two elephants kept their
howdahs as far apart as the main-chains of two line-of-
battle ships would separate their hammock nettings.
I could not make an explanatory speech to the
Rajah, who sat smiling with extended hand, the
finger-tips some six feet away; and thus I stood,
supremely foolish, and very uncertain what to do, till
a sudden lurch, a vis a fergo, a desperate resolution, all
combined, and with a desperate, ponderous flop, full
thirteen stone and ten pounds (it was in the time of
Plancus, and after much exudation of ichor in the
hills), I dropped on the Rajah’s feet, and took my seat
at his side. Dear good man 1 Kings have long and
unfeeling arms ; but I presume their toes are as
sensitive as those of most mortal men. The Rajah of
Puttiala never winced."

When the Rajah and his visitors reached Patiala
the Army was drawn up in double lines, with six
guns on one flank unlimbered for salute. The house-
tops were covered with spectators. Russell felt that
he had no official position or rank of any kind to
entitle him to these marked honours, and he was
overwhelmed with embarrassment. Suddenly the
guns opened. To his dismay the Rajah at the first
gun gently inclined his head towards him, and Russell
was obliged to bow in return. At each subsequent
discharge the Rajah repeated his salute and received
a similar, most unwilling acknowledgment from
Russell

After a rest inside the palace the visitors were
entertained at a durbar, at which all the important

REFUSING THE CROWN

345

1858]

persons of Patiala were present, dressed in gorgeous
raiment. The Rajah sat upon a throne, with Russell
on his right hand and Mr. Melville on his left. After
the whole Court had been presented to Russell there
followed what, for a poor man with a family to
support, was perhaps the most trying experience of
all. Servants bearing trays covered with jewels,
bracelets, necklaces, bangles, shawls, and embroidered
work, marched up to the throne and laid their treasures
at Russell’s feet, and the Rajah requested that he
would kindly take anything he liked. The first tray
bore emeralds and diamonds, which Mr. Melville had
told him were worth ;^30,ooo. Mr. Melville had in
fact described this ceremony in advance, and on
Russell inquiring whether he ought to accept a
present or not, Mr. Melville had answered that as
he was not an official he could do as he pleased.
And here was ;4'30|000 at his feet I Sadly he refused
the crown, well knowing that it would never come
his way again. Before all the trays had been dis-
played he selected the plainest looking square of
kincob which he could see, and this was set aside
for him.

At the end of the durbar there was a difficult piece
of negotiation with the Rajah, who apparently expected
his guests to remain at Patiala several days. He had
prepared fireworks and illuminations. Russell, how-
ever, had not time to stay, and Melville had to request
the Rajah to permit them to leave Patiala that evening.
After many expressions of regret the Rajah resigned
himself to their departure.

The Rajah of Patiala, of course, served the British
interest well during the Mutiny ; he raised and equipped
a large force in addition to his regular army and

346

THE PROCLAMATION [Chap. XXVII.

placed it at our disposal, and he gave us all the help
in animals, carts, and money that he could afford. In
his diary Russell contrasts the loyalty of such a mat i
with the behaviour of others, who, though they did not
at first side with the mutineers, had since passed into
open rebellion. He wondered how many more would
have been found on the wrong side if the policy of
general suppression and revenge advocated by some
persons had been adopted.

“ It is fortunate for England,” he writes, “ that her
rulers in India and her generals in the field have been
animated, on one point at all events, by a unanimous
spirit, and that, in the Cabinet and in the operations
carried on by our generals for the pacification of
the disturbed districts, they have acted generally as
became enlightened statesmen and Christian men,
in opposition toi the ferocious howl which has been
raised by men who have lived so long among Asiatics
as to have imbibed their worst feelings and to have
forgotten the sentiments of civilisation and religion.
As cruel as covenanters without their faith, and as
relentless as inquisitors without their fanaticism, these
sanguinary creatures, from the safe seclusion of their
desks, utter stridulous cries, as they plunge their pens
into the seething ink, and shout out ‘Blood! more
blood!!’”

Shortly before he reached Allahabad, where the
headquarters of the Army were established, Russell
received a letter from Lord Clyde, who said : —

“ I have much pleasure in answering your appeal
and giving you a hint on the approaching operations.
The first object you will understand as a matter of
course to be the early reduction of Oude. During
the last two months great progress has been made
towards this end in the occupation of Fyzabad, Futteh-
pore, Partabghur, etc.

“ The lines of road between Cawnpore and Lucknow,
Lucknow and Fyzabad, Futtehpore and Allahabad,
are all strongly held. It is intended to operate from

LORD CLYDE

347

1858]

two points at the same time, viz., from Rohilcund to
the North East of the Province, dispersing the bands
of rebels in that quarter, driving them, if possible, to
the Gogra, and establishing Government at Futteh-
pore. At the same time parallel columns will advance
through what is called the Baiswarree country from
the line stretching from Salone to Fyzabad. The
first part of the latter movement is about to com-
mence. Colonel Kelly, H.M. 34th _Regt, has been
directed to move up the district lying between the
Goomtee and Gogra from Azimghur with a brigade
of two infantry regiments, one of irregular cavalry,
and one Field battery. He will take post at Ackbur-
pore and I hope occupy Tanda, thus completing the
work which has been m progress in the Eastern part
of Oude for some time. As soon as his movement
is effected, in which he will be aided by Sir Hope
Grant, from Futtehpore, we shall have our flanks
well secured, and the advancement will be made on
the most powerful rebels in Oude — Lai Madhoo of
Amethie and Beni Madhoo Sing of Roy Bareilty and
Shunkerpore. These will, it is to be hoped, be finally
disposed of, and the whole country as far as the
Cawnpore road occupied. In the meantime a strong
movable column will have been collected on the
Cawnpore and Lucknow road to prevent a retreat
to the Westward, while the posts North of the Goomtee
will be on the alert to interrupt fugitives.”

In due course Russell reached Allahabad and found
a letter from Delane : —

September ^rd, 1858.

“ My Dear Russell,— I am delighted to hear from
you even when you grumble so audibly, as in your
letter of July 19th just received. It is at least a
healthy sign.

“First, as to the Proclamation* business.^ It was
never discussed here on its merits or demerits alone.
It came complicated with Ellenborough’s insane
despatch, which compelled his resignation and was
made the battle-ground of the two parties in the fierce

* The Proclamation announcing the confiscation of lands, etc.,
which had been issued after the capture of Luclmow.

348 THE PROCLAMATION [Chap. XXVII.

struggle for office. It was fairly to be presumed,
too, that Canning, after having suffered for months
from imputations of leniency and undue favour of the
natives, would only have threatened such severity
upon good and substantial reasons, and the Govern-
ment proposed to condemn him at once without
waiting for his reasons. To bait a man for ten
months for being too lenient and then publicly to
censure him for a solitary act of harshness seemed
too unjust. Now I hear every Indian saying that
proclamations are of no avail at all, and that the terms
of this are now entirely immaterial so far as the people
to whom it was addressed were concerned.

“ As to the Lucknow letters, the only wonder is you
were able to write them_ at all— not that the order
of dates was entirely unintelligible. I spent hours
in trying to discover the order of succession, and you
see the result. From the great amount — two or three
packets arriving at once — they could not all appear
together, but I don’t believe that in all one column
was omitted. You must remember that the E. Mail
is only an abridgment of the Times, and having to
cram two days’ Times into one is a task which requires
a good deal of scissorial pressure.

“ India is now happily no longer a party question,
and I have no wish but that you should give us the
benefit of your own observations. On one subject
you will see we have been marvellously of accord —
our support of Sir Colin Campbell. Every word of
your defence, received to-day, had been anticipated
m a reply to the very able letter of ‘A Disabled
Officer,^ who seems to have embodied all the dis-
content of India. I hope you will see both this and
our reply.

“As to your own letters, don’t fancy that they are
wasted because you don’t see all in one paper. I have
sometimes in the exigencies of the Session spread the
publication of a single letter over several days when
there has been no actual news to tell.

“ I have got from Tice by this mail a careful medical
description of your leg and its hurt, from which
I argue that you are quite recovered long before this.
We thought more of the sunstroke than of the kick,

OUTRAM’S FEARS

349

i8s8]

but you seem to have forgotten that altogether. . . .
Good-bye. I am ever very sincerely yours^ T D ”

Another letter waiting for Russell was from
Outram : —

“ Calcutta,

September 2gth, 1858.

“ My Dear Russell, — I have barely time to-day
to thank you for your most kind letter of the i 8 th inst.,
just received, but as I am not likely to be better off as
regards leisure for some time to come, I scribble off
this hasty acknowledgment.

“ I wish I had time to enlarge on the points alluded
to by you, but I can only now say that my views are
entirely in accord with yours — that I was delighted
with your manly opposition to the un-English,
unmanly, spirit with which the generality of our
countrymen were imbued when you first came among
us, and which I regret to see is far from extinguished
— the unnatural desire for blood and vengeance which
first seized the popular mind in its frenzy, but which
it is criminal in thinking men to maintain now that
they have cooled down, and not more criminal than
foolish. For how can we hope to rule a people by
fostering hatred between the governing class and
the governed ?

“ 1 confess that I am as far from being satisfied as
you are with the present aspect of affairs. Not only do
I think, with you, that mere conquest is no firm basis
of power, but I think that a large portion of the
element whereby we achieved the conquest is a new
creation as likely to be as dangerous as that we have
put down, while the viper which so lately stung us
IS but scotched, not killed. Our only chance of
recovering the affections of the majority of the
revolted soldiery, who had been drawn into the revolt
by force of circumstances against their wiU, was by
opening the door to mercy immediately on the fall of
Lucknow, when the offer could have been made with
every appearance of magnanimity and no chance of
misconstruction. That opportunity was lost, and
since then the Sepoys have been taught to believe

350 THE PROCLAMATION [Chap. XXVII.

that we desire nothing but their destruction, and
those who heretofore have been but lukewarm, if not
unwilling participators in the rebellion have become
a mass of desperate ruffians, and all have more or less
since then joined in atrocities which they feel must
bar them from the possibility of pardon. They see
nothing left, therefore, but resistance and death, and
have no object but to do the utmost mischief in their
power while they live, and the desperation they are
now driven to is calculated to enlist the sympathy of
all of their creed and colour, who must now regard us
with bitter hatred. When, therefore, can we hope to
restore confidence and good feeling among so large a
class of our native subjects ? How long can we rely
on the obedience of the Sikh Army, on the good faith
of the Jung Bahadur, etc.? Only so long as we
maintain our present European Army. And how
long may peace in Europe last to allow all these
British troops to be retained in Asia? But our

f reatest difficulty will be perhaps that of finance,
low long can England stand the drain that India
must be for many years to come ? There are many
other sources of anxiety which I have not time even
to allude to, but I may perhaps hereafter burden you
with my gloomy thoughts. Believe me, my dear Russell,

“ Most sincerely yours,

“J. OUTRAM.”

Much of Outram’s criticism in that letter was
answered in practice by the Queen’s Proclamation
which announced the transference of the government
of India from the Company to the Crown. Russell
was present at Allahabad on November ist when the
Proclamation was publicly read by Lord Canning.
A platform had been built for the purpose near the
fort. Russell thought the ceremony cold and
spiritless; he was told that the Indians had been
dissuaded from coming to listen to the promises of
pardon and non-annexation. Those natives who
were present were for the most part officials in the

THE NEW ERA

351

1858]

public offices. Russell was amused by hearing a
sergeant, who was on duty at the foot of the platform,
say, with a masterly inopportuneness, to one of his men,
“ I am going away for a moment ; you stay here and
take care no nigger goes up.” In the evening there
was a banquet at the fort which “ passed off as tamely
as the ceremonial of reading the Proclamation.”

Russell, his eye as so often guiding his mind,
probably failed to perceive how signal a transaction
was effected that day, for all the unimpressiveness of
the ceremonial. A new era began then — an era in
which no doubt serious errors have been committed,
but in which from the outset the methods have been
new and the spirit unexceptionable. For all practical
purposes, under the rule of the merchant princes
India had paid a tribute* to Great Britain; but the
Roman model of government disappeared at the
moment when the Crown took the place of the
Company. The only true principle of governing a
subject race was asserted when the administration
was taken out of the hands of those who were
interested in the commercial exploitation of the
country. When State officials have erred since it has
• not been because they have tried to seiwe two
irreconcilable interests — the interest of good govern-
ment and the interest of their pockets. If Russell did
not recognise, or affirm, that a radical change had
been brought into the relations of Englishmen and the
Indian natives by the transfer of the executive to
the Crown and the British Parliament, he at all
events treated of those relations justly and humanely
from a different point of view. His view was the

Lord Cromer’s “ Ancient and Modem ImperiaJism.”

352

THE TKULLAMAIIUIN [’-HAP. AAVII.

immediate one. It was not primarily his business to
weigh grand political principles. And thus he passed
over with a few words of disdain for the ceremony a
Proclamation "which was a charter of liberties, bold
in its acceptance of responsibility, buoyant with
optimism, gracious in language, and great in its
simplicity.

CHAPTER XXVIII
LETTERS TO DELANE

Russell had little rest on the night of the Queen’s
Proclamation. The Oudh campaign was about to
open. After the banquet he lay down in his clothes,
boots and all, and about one o’clock in the morning
he was roused by his servant flashing a light in his
face and offering him a cup of tea. He rose, and in a
few minutes was crossing the Ganges by the bridge of
boats which was dimly lighted by a few lamps and
was rising and falling with the surging of the violent
black waters. On the other side he was once more in
Oudh, and started upon a miserable march of over
thirty miles. Part of the way he rode with Lord
Clyde, who told him that he would not proceed to
extremities in dealing with any of the chiefs till he
knew for certain that they had received copies of the
Proclamation.

The problem of the Oudh campaign was a serious
one, because if the very many strong places which
were believed to be holding out were assaulted with
only a moderate British loss at each, there would soon
be no British Army left. On November 9th the Army
halted in front of Amethi, which was held by its
Rajah, and Lord Clyde was soon in deep perplexity.
His men were fired upon, but then the Rajah sent
out a vakeel, who expressed the Rajah’s regret and
said that the Sepoys had fired of their own accord,
and that the Rajah had “ no influence over some
thousands of his men.” He said further that the

R.— VOL. I.

A A

354 LETTERS TO DELANE [Chap. XXVIII.

Rajah would like to surrender with his guns and his
infantry, but that he could not be responsible for
the rest of his troops. Lord Clyde peremptorily
demanded the surrender of the fort and all the troops
in arms, and in the night the Rajah of Amethi stole
out of his stronghold and came into the British camp.
He declared for himself that he had done his best to
make his people surrender. But who could tell?
During the following day Lord Clyde held his hand,
all the time carefully watching the fort, which made no
sign. The next morning it became known that there
was not a soul in the place. The enemy had all
escaped ; and the Rajah, who evidently did not want
the dangers and discomforts of a campaign, had for his
part succeeded in saving his life. Such were the
baffling conditions of this campaign in Oudh. When
Russell had experienced this kind of thing more than
once he had a suspicion that the British spies were
impartial in their services to both sides.

Once Russell became detached from the column in
the night, when he suddenly saw near him a group of
men, who separated and ran into the fields on either
side of the road. Not liking their appearance, he
reined in his horse, and felt that his revolver was ready
before he passed on again along the road, keeping a
good look-out. Close to the spot where he had first
seen the- men two of them sprang out, one armed with
a pistol and the other having a shining blade in his
hand. Russell had just time to plunge his spurs into
his horse, let his head go, and ride straight at them.
One was knocked down by the horse, and the other,
as he tried to catch the bridle, was felled by a blow
from Russell’s whip, but they were both on their legs
and away in a moment. Soon Russell found a picket

A SPECIMEN DAY

3 S 5

i8s8]

of Lord Clyde’s column and reported the encounter.
But the next day he was chaffed a good deal, as it was
asserted — Russell strongly dissenting, and producing
evidence to the contrary — that the men were not bud-
mashes, but faithful spies in the British service, that
they had been scared at Russell’s approach, and that
when they sprang out on the road they were declaring
their presence lest Russell should fire on them by
mistake.

In his diary Russell describes a specimen day’s
march in this campaign against an evasive enemy, who
had always just evacuated the position which Lord
Clyde reached : —

“Here is one’s life at present: First bugle at 5.15
a.m. ; strike tents, a cup of tea before starting, a
groping, stumbling ride out through tent-pegs, camp-
followers regardant, camels couchant, elephants passant,
and horses rampant, to the road ; very cold and chill
ere the sun rises ; then jog, jog, at the rate of two miles
an hour or so, with a halt of a few minutes eveiy hour,
to allow the baggage and the rearguard to close up ;
artfully riding from one flank to another as the breeze,
or rather current of air, drives the smothering clouds
of dust across the line of march, in order to evade the
nuisance as much as possible

“ At last, about 2 o’clock p.m., the welcome sight of
the assistant quartermaster-general riding over the

S lain in front, and directing the movements of his
agmen, who mark out the lines of the camp, announces
that we are at our resting-place ; but it is long ere the
camels stalk in upon us, and cone after cone of canvas
offers brief shelter to the Rechabites. Each man is
choked with dust and fagged with heat and slow riding.
The water-skin of the bheesty gives a refreshing
shower-bath ; but it is nearly fotu: o’clock before the
tent is all in order, for the furniture drops in slowly
and fitfully, as the coolies behave on the road ^ Then
darkness closes in, and if with an effort, of the violence
of which in my own case I can speak conscientiously,

A A 2

356 LETTERS TO DELANE [Chap. XXVIII.

one has sat down to write, the slow beat of the camp
gong soon announces that the dinner hour — about
6.30 p.m. — is near at hand. The meal lasts nearly an
hour, and there are few who can resist the temptation
of the charpoy on returning to their tents from dinner,
about 8.30 or 9 o’clock p.m. How our servants exist I
cannot ascertain by any reference to my own expe-
riences. No English servant could — or if he could
he certainly would not — exhibit the patience and powers
of endurance of the bearers, syces and grass-cutters.
My syce follows me all day, for six or seven hours, at
a jog-trot, not a sign of fatigue on his dusty face, or a
drop of perspiration on his dark skin. He is heavily
weighted too, for he carries a horse-cloth, a telescope,
a bag of grain (part for himself and part for his horse),
and odds and ends useful on a march. When we halt
he is at hand to hold the horse. At the end of the
march there is no rest for him ; he grooms the horse
with assiduity, hand-rubs him, washes out his nostrils,
ears and hoofs, waters him, soaks his grain and feeds
him ; then he has to clean saddlery, and bits and spurs ;
finally, at some obscure hour of night, he manages to
cook a cake or two of wheat flour, to get a drink of
water, to smoke his hubble-hubble, and then after a
fantasia or so on the tom-tom, aided by a snuffling solo
through the nose, in honour of some unknown beauty,
wraps himself up, head and all, in his calico robe, and
sleeps sub Jove frigido, till the first bugle rouses him
out to feed and prepare his horse for the march.”

On Christmas Day Russell was disquieted by noticing
that Lord Clyde was walking up and down, and looking
at the sky inquiringly in a manner which indicated, to
those who knew his habits, that he was about to march.
Soon he announced this intention to his Staff, but
was met with respectful remonstrances. “ Oh, sir, re-
member it is Christmas Day." When it was represented
that the men’s puddings would be spoilt Lord Clyde
gave way, and gave way so handsomely that he pro-
vided an entertainment of his own, to which Russell
was invited. Russell gazed upon the barons of beef,

1859 ]

THE FINAL WORK

357

the turkeys, the mutton, the game, the chickens and
fish, all spread on snowy-white tablecloths in well-
lighted tents, and as the sherry, champagne and port
went round he reflected that campaigning in India and
the Crimea were two very different things.

Although the elusiveness of the enemy was annoying
enough, it was a sign that their serious resistance was
at an end, and in the middle of January, 1859, Ford
Clyde was able to return to Lucknow, and inspect from
there the final work of pacification. Russell remained
in Lucknow till the end of February and wrote some
long'ffetters to Delane on the situation. The following
extracts are from those letters : —

January 20th, 1859.

“ I believe that some great effort must be made to
check the aggressive and antipathetic treatment of the
natives. I believe that India is the talisman now by
which England is the greatest Power in the world, and
that by its loss we lose the magic and prestige of the
name which now holds the world in awe. I believe
that we never can preserve India by brute force alone
except at a cost which will swallow up all the wealth
of the Home country, and that we can only hold it by
brute force unless we make some changes in our system
of government. I am told that our policy is changed.
I hear that the Queen has proclaimed the rights of
native States, and seeks no increment of territory, and
yet at this very moment the conversation of every
Indian officer at the Mess table, or wherever the
affairs of India may be discussed, clearly reveals the
conviction that sooner or later we must absorb every
State between Ceylon and Peshawur. It is our destiny
— ^we cannot help it — the huge stone gathering weight
as it rolls must be impelled onwards and forward no
matter whether Sisypnus be crushed or not. I am
among men who are not, indeed, the rulers of India,
but who must be the instruments by which India
must be ruled, and I fear that most of these are of
opinion that the government of this vast Empire must

358 LETTERS TO DELANE [Chap. XXVIII.

depend on the bayonet, and that it is ridiculous to
attempt to govern the country by any other means. . . .
The Press of India, though it does not represent the
feelings of the high civilians, is but too faithful in its
exposition of the general feeling of a considerable
class of English in India. Among those men are many
personal friends of mine whose characters I admire
and respect. I get hot in the head and red in the face
talking to them every night. I argue that their senti-
ments are.opposed to civilisation, to humanity, to justice,
to universal experience, to common sense, and in reply
I am told that human nature is nothing, and that I
know nothing of India. I recollect that sound legisla-
tion in Ireland was resisted by the same cry, and the
same armour defied the weapons of reason in the
English Parliament. I hope in God they inay not
be equally successful here. We are disarming the
country, it is true, and we are putting out of the hands
of the people the means of resistance, the temptations
to disorder, and the incitements of resistance to the
law of our rule; but against the silent, steady action of
the antipathy of nearly two hundred millions of people,
once fairly excited, no power can stand. • ; • .

“No one here knows when Lord Canning is going
home, though it is concluded he will do so ere the
summer sets in. His physician has assured him he
cannot spend another summer in India without most
serious risk. He delights in mystifying the Indian
papers, which, unlike Cato, are never weary of con-
jecture. Lord Clyde is most anxious to go home, but, ot
course, he is held here for the present and will be for
some time, by the duties of his position. He is showing
signs of age, hard work mental and bodily, though he is
still a wonderful, vigorous old man and I’d back him
against the Garrick smoking-room for a race or a walk
this minute. It is said Rose will succeed him. That
would be a disappointment to Mansfield ; but though
Mansfield is by far the abler man in my humble judg-
ment, the claims of Rose are too strong to be set aside.
It strikes me that Mansfield is one of the clearest-
minded, most sound and clever men I ever met. All
the combinations and plans of the campaign were his,
, but his manner is supercilious, and he shows he knows

QUESTIONINGS

359

1859]

his own powers. What he may be in independent
command no one can tell, but as a regimental officer he
had the highest reputation, and under fire, as I have
seen, he is as cool as any man could be. . . .

“ I wouM fain have your advice as to myself ere I
leave India, but I fear that will be now impossible.
My future is dark, dreary, and uncertain enough.
The Jefferson Brick fever of my existence is nearly
passed. Four narrow escapes have I had of a violent
death, which would bring with it no glory, no pension
for helplessness, no provision for my family — escapes
which have not brought me even the worthless credit of
the kind I could gain by chronicling them and blowing
my own trumpet. Then, again, I have nearly fallen
a victim to the diseases of the Indian climate. It is
not_ fair to my poor wife to leave her to contend
against the burthen of our family, and to bear the
heavy charges of educating and rearing so many
children. Death has indeed been heavy in my little
fold and taken the youngest of the flock, and I feel
that my absence on such an occasion must have added
deeply to the deep affliction of the most loving of
mothers. But I am going home to uncertain labours
— all is cloud and darkness before me. Can you
throw any light upon it ? I have never asked a favour
for myself of anyone in all my life, but I should be
happy indeed if any means were pointed out whereby
I could obtain some secure provision for my family.
If I had a little capital I had nearly been tempted
to become a settler in the Terai, though the settlement
would possibly have been on the side of the Terai,
and not of me! Of course, I shall get some respite
and time to look around me when I return, but I
wish I could see some indication of the path I ought
to follow. I find no consolation, I confess, in the
prospect of a European war. The plains of neither
Lombardy nor Belgium, nor Burgundy, tempt me;
the passage of the Alps under a second or third
Napoleon has no charms; even a tough fight in the
chops of the Channel, and ‘Great victory over the
French,’ are not attractive to your Special ; and he is
indifferent to crossing the Rhine under a heavy fire
and to ‘ the bombardment of Vienna ’ — all exciting and

360 LETTERS TO DELANE [Chap. XXVIII.

delightful matters for the Graphic, which he abandons
to his successors, turning his face steadily towards
Onslow Square, and sighing ever* . . . angulus
[several words illegible].

“ I saw your brother often at Allahabad, and found
that he had joined the malcontents, political and
military. I reasoned, and he swore, and we parted
good friends. Thackeray and Yates, I hear, are at it
still. Thackeray, too, says if is me, I hear, but that
must be a mistake. I did make one row, but that was
healed and made up long ago. I suppose Albert
Smith will have an immense success. Dickens literally
‘coined,’ on dit, during his tour all over the kingdom.

“My letters have produced a most material effect
on the tone of the Indian Press, and as to Society,
though I undergo a good deal of quizzing, it is more
than compensated when I hear one man who threatens
to break every bone in his bearer’s skin held in check
by the half-serious, half-joking remonstrance, ‘You
had better not, or you will have the Times down on
you.’ I feel I may have been sometimes intemperate
in my remarks on the Indian Press, but, conscientiously,
I declare I believe it to be the most mean, malignant,
and false in the world. The spirit of old Grub Street —
anonymous slandering — sought refuge here, and, above
all, it revels in freedom from cudgelling. . . .

“ Could you point out that I never accused the
Anglo-Indians of the Company’s service, or the old
race, of cruelty and roughness ? I allude generally
to the low, ignorant, and violent newcomers, and non-
officials, who come here to make their fortunes."

February x^th, 1859.

“ I do not want to repeat my regret that I do not
hear from you, for I am in hopes that the mails now
on their way to us will renew my old source of
gratification. If they do not, it is unlikely I shall
receive any letter from you in India, for I purpose
starting immediately for Calcutta and forcing my way
on board the steamer of March 9th. I am going to
stop with Outram at Calcutta whilst making my essay
for a passage, and if I can at all manage it, I will

• Probably, IIU terremtm mihi praeUr ornnes angulus rHet,

i8s9] ENGLISH FAULTS 361

visit an Indigo district on my way. Although I have
suffered much in India — a leg that will be ever a
source of pain and constitutional disturbance to me,
occasional (I hope you don’t find it permanent)
muddiness of head and intellect, two sharp sicknesses,
much anxiety, and no small abuse and misrepresenta-
tion — I shall ever regard the country with immense
interest, and shall almost regret to leave it . . .

“ Our rule is now more secure in India than it has
ever been before, and nothing but extreme oppression
and injustice, and the misery and wretchedness and
despair which may arise from these, can produce
another rising ; but, at the same time, there are more
doubts as to our intentions, more suspicions of our
motives, greater jealousy of our race, than there ever
was before ; and these feelings are mixed up with the
animosities of a defeated nationality, such as it is, and
with resentment against those who in their indis-
criminate zeal and desire of vengeance punished the
innocent with the guilty. What I observe with
regret is this — that after an Englishman has been a
few years in India, unless he is a man of reflection
and some education, he forgets altogether the prin-
ciples of his life, the rules of his religion, and the
feelings of his civilisation ; he regards rebellion or
insurrection not as a political offence but as a blasphemy
and sacrilege of ineffable magnitude committed against
the Deity, whom he vicariously (and imperfectly)
represents. ... I think the great faults of our race
here are to be corrected by public opinion at home.
Unless there is a large flood of light let in upon
Indian matters we may revert to our old poco curante
way of doing business, and be overwhelmed in a
second catastrophe — anna ministrat Can we be
just and fear not ? I think we can. I do not believe
in the innate depravity of nigritude, except in so far
as that depravity is inherited by him, which is common
to all of human birth, and that it is developed by
human institutions and bad laws and low standards
of morality. I cannot deny we are brought face to
face with the England of the Heptarchy in many
respects. We are in contact with an immensely
ancient, obdurate, imyielding civilisation, and we find

362 LETTERS TO DELANE [Chap. XXVIII.

its fruits in a people as punctilious as a Norman, as
touchy about personal honour and as indifferent to
truth as Front de Boeuf, as superstitious and as hurtful
as a Saxon monk, as ignorant as a Welsh harper, as
clannish and as lairdolatrist as a Celt ; and we set at
once to work to improve them, to force them into our
clothes, ideas, religion, and boots, and then, dissatis-
fied that they don’t at once fit the mould, we call
them niggers, deny they have souls to be saved, find
they have bodies only to be kicked, and at once
emancipate ourselves in our relations with them from
all the teaching of our own civilisation.

" Now you have trusted me before in a time of
great trial, and I don’t think the confidence the Times
reposed in my representations was misplaced. It is
my greatest pride and honour to think so, whilst I
acknowledge the deep debt I owe you for reposing
faith in me at such a period. I am satisfied now,
more than I ever was in my life as to the truth of
any view taken by me of any one case, that I am
right with respect to Indian affairs, but I cannot
expect you always to put the same faith in me when
1 am recording impressions and moral convictions as
you did when I was stating material results. I grow
tiresome and knock off.

“You must know that Lord Clyde is in an awful fix
about the Indian Armv question. Fie had been pressed
a good deal by son Altesse for opinions on the subject,
but he objects, for he has not fully considered the
subject beyond the one point, that faith must be kept
with the officers of the Indian Army ; and on that
one point there is a disposition at the H. G., or
wherever it may be, to treat these unfortunates
de haut en has. Therefore he is obliged to state his
opinions without giving offence, and at the same time
he is struggling with Canning, who is anxious, or
supposed to be, to get the patronage of the Indian
Army into the old groove and not let it run into the
hands of the home authorities either at the H. Gds.
or of the Council. The history of recent changes of
quarters, duly reported and corrected by telegraph, is
this. When Sir Colin (he hates being called ‘My
Lord ’) was seedy the other day he received a letter

LORD CLYDE

363

1859]

from Canning advising him for his health to go up to
Simla, and orders were dispatched to engage a resi-
dence accordingly that very day. But my Lord as
IS his wont, turned over the matter that night in’ his
clear, shrewd, head, and there he smelt a metaphysical
rat of great odour. ‘Ho,’ says he, ‘ho, ho, I see—
Canning wants me to go up to Simla in order to get
me away from Calcutta, and to work the Army and the
new plans in his own way. At the same time it will
be seen at home that I am no use, and that if I am to
be at Simla awav from the Council I might as well be
at home at once. So up he gets, and sends off word
at once that he won't go to Simla, though the doctors
^ear his life is endangered if he goes to Calcutta.

1 hen he writes to Canning and asks him distinctly
what he wishes— whether he is to remain at Lucknow,
or go to Calcutta as his health is quite restored. And
he IS not going to Simla, and Lord Canning— as is
his wont— deliberates and does not reply. Lord Clyde
is an awfully tough old customer, and he is now nearly
as well as ever he was, and as keen and sharp as
ever.

“ Mansfield is, however, the great designing head,
the man of thought and coinbination, but I doubt if
he has the hig’h military qualities, though he certainly
has far higher intellect, and takes a statesmanlike
view of things. There is a secret animosity on his part
towards Rose, who seems to be his rival m India, and
h^e certainly drew out, as I saw with my own eyes.
Rose s plans for the campaign, which the latter implicitly
followed. Everyone shouts out against Canning’s pro-
crastination. Even Montgomery,* who is one of the
most reserved and cautious of men, said to me the day
I took leave of him : ‘ It is dreadful trying to get him
to do anything. It quite paralyses the business of
Government’

“We must get out three or four times the number
of Englishmen we had or have here— there is a want
of hands in every department But as that would

* Sir Robert Montgomery. With singular boldness and presence
of mind he disarmed the Sepoys at L^ore when he heard of the
niutiny at Delhi. He was appointed Chief Commissioner of Oudh,
in succession to Outram.

364 LETTERS TO DELANE [Chap. XXVIII.

involve a reduction of salaries no one will recommend
it. How is it possible for one man to act as magis-
trate and revenue officer for 200,000 or 400,000 people
scattered over districts as large as Berkshire ? And
yet he has to try to do it, and at once falls into the
hands of his native assistants. With the question of
salaries is connected the mode of living, and certainly
that is a ticklish one, for although the living is not luxu-
rious, or good, it is expensive. Champagne at 12s. or
14s. a bottle is not more out of proportion to a captain’s
or deputy-magistrate’s salary than is beer at 2s. td. to
a sergeant’s. Every man takes ten jumps on the social
scale when he comes to India — the private rides a
tat; the Sub mounts a buggy; the Captain keeps
hunting dogs and a phaeton, and the Colonel: well,
he’s the Duke at Badminton. Take my mess — there
is first the Q.M.G. R.2,soo in all his capacities per
mensem, i.e., £2^0 per month; the Doctor, ;£'2,ioo per
annum; the Dy. Adjt. Genl., £1,000 per annum; the
D.A.Q.M.G. £1,200; one A.D.C. £950 per annum, one
Asst. Surgeon, £800 per annum ; Commissary Genl.,
£1,500; Asst. -Corny. Genl., £900; and so on — none
under £800. Simkin * (champagne) is the rule ; claret
for a moderate man ; and two bottles of beer for
economists, which is 5s. per diem. As to servants,
it’s monstrous. I have less than any, but one, man in
camp, and yet I could parade a lot that could take the
shine out of most Chesham Place or country squires’
houses.”

At the end of February Russell went to Calcutta,
where he stayed with Sir James Outram till he took
passage for England at the end of March. On the
eve of his departure he wrote to Mr. Sherer : —

“ I go home to a sick wife, carrying from India no
very pleasant memories, a damaged reputation, great
popular enmity — the only Englishman, I believe, who
ever left India poorer than when he came into it —
with nothing to cheer me save the conviction that I

* “ The dinner was good and the iced simkin, sir, delicious.” — ■
W. D. Arnold’s “ Oakfield.”

FAREWELL

1859]

365

did my duty according to the light that was vouch-
safed to me, and the damnation of a faint applause
awaiting my efforts. But seeing all this were to do
again I would do it and would wish it no other than
it were, barring that horse kick, the flight of Bareilly
and one or two things my soul wots of. God help
you and grant us a meeting in happier and cooler
lands right soon. Be sure and write to me. Just
drop one little white link from time to time across
the ocean to keep the chain between us entire, and
have me in your mind and memory as I hold you.
And so farewell.”

CHAPTER XXIX
LEADER-WRITING

On arriving at Marseilles, the ship in which Russell
had made the passage from India was put into quaran-
tine. The passengers were surprised and resentful ;
and yet under the quarantine regulations of those
days as much might have been expected, for the ship
had “communicated” with the shore at Valetta, and
Valetta was in quarantine because there happened to
be cholera in Tunis or Tripoli or Algeria. The argu-
ment, if indirect, was notoriously effectual, and when
the passengers came on deck on the morning of their
arrival at Marseilles, there was the yellow flag at the
main.

^ “It would have been amusing,” writes Russell,

had riot the outlook been so dismal, to watch the
faces of my fellow sufferers as they came up in fine
spirits at the termination of our voyage. ‘ Ouarantine ^
Impossible!”’ ./ o

Even Colville, Russell’s old Crimean friend, who
was on board, and who generally presented the
imperturbable front of the philosopher, was for once
perturbed and could find no comfort in his Herodotus.
Presently the ship glided off under the tutelage of the
sanitary officer, a sad man, who regarded the passengers
as infect and moved morosely among apparatus for
fumigating the mails.

The ship moored close to the lazaretto which was on
a reef of rock indulgently spoken of as an island. If
any of the passengers liked they could land and ' even

RUSSELL’S NAMESAKE

367

1859]

sleep there. While they were still discussing their
fate upon deck, Colonel Sir William Russell appeared
with a look of authority on his face. “ I am not going
to stand this nonsense,” he said. “I know the
Emperor. I am going to appeal to him to take me
out of quarantine, as I am the candidate * for Dover,
and I must be at the nomination. If he releases me
I think we shall all be set free.” A melancholy smile,
a murmur of profound scepticism, were all that was
provoked by this pronouncement. As for Sir William
Russell, the only thing that mitigated his confidence
was the difficulty of sending a message. The sanitary
officer was at first indignant, then contemptuous, at
the idea of any person telegraphing to the Emperor.
The Prefect would not dare to do so, even the Admiral
of the Port would not— and so on and so forth. As
to release from quarantine, had not the General in
command of Algeria just been released after his seven
days ? “ Parbleu, ces messieurs oublient le respect
qui est dti k sa Majesty et aux droits du public.” He
flatly refused to send the telegram.

“Whereupon,” Russell continues, “Sir William
dived below and presently reappeared with a tre-
mendous envelope, addressed to M. le Prefet, signed
‘ Russell, Colonel du Service de sa Majestd

Reine d’Angleterre,’ and sealed with the largest seal
that could be found, and sent it over the side with the
air of one who would say, ‘ Refuse that if you darel

The sanitary officer consulted with another official ;
the coxswain assisted. They were evidently impressed
but afraid to yield. The letter to the Prefect contained the
telegram, with a note of explanation and a message that
the telegram should be sentwith the least possible delay.

* He was then M.P. for Dover. At the election of i860 he was
returned as a Liberal for Norwich.

368 LEADER-WRITING [Chap. XXIX.

The passengers landed and strolled gloomily about
their rocky prison. “Any answer to the telegram ? ”
was the first question when they returned on board.
They knew there was not. But it was a comfort, and
at the same time a reproach, to ask. Whenever a
boat came oflf with communications for the captain,
everyone said, “ Any answer from the Emperor ? ”
At last the gallant author of the message retired before
his sly tormentors, and, Achilles-like, secluded himself
in his cabin. Night came, and despondency settled
deeper on the ship’s company. One wretched man
suggested that the Emperor would order the Prefect,
or somebody, to detain the ship an extra week for
impertinence— just imagine a French Colonel tele-
graphing to Queen Victoria because he had once been
d la suite to some royal personage at the British Court.

The sequel surprised everyone, except apparently
Sir William Russell. The entry in Russell’s diary
for the next day, Easter Tuesday, April 26th, runs
as follows: —

“Aroused in my berth at 5.30 am. by voices and
lights. An official in oilskin and cocked-hat all black,
streaming and dripping wet like an enormous slug,
held up a paper for me to read, and stood with head
uncovered as I tried to make my sleepy eyes do their
duty. It was an order from the Minister of Marine,
directing the authorities ‘par*ordre de sa Majeste
I’Empereur’ to liberate from quarantine ‘Sir Russell
revenant de I'lnde, et en route pour Angleterre, et ses
amis,’ and to do everything possible to facilitate their
^eedy departure and safe conduct through France.
This was indeed a delightful surprise. F ortune favours
the daring. But I doubt if anyone but the Emperor
would have strained his powers for a foreign friend w
j)an materia. The joyful news ran through the ship,
and I rushed off at once to the real Simon Pure, and
woke him up with the document in my hand, closely

i859] the EMPEROR’S FRIEND 369

followed by the Adjoint of the Capitaine du port, the
Sanitary officer, and several other officials, all in a
state of respectful anxiety to get us ashore and off and
away. A special train was in waiting by superior
orders! Our baggage would be sent on. It was
recommended that Messieurs les amis de Sir Russell
should only take what they needed for the journey
home, and the Douane would pass everything we
wanted without examination. There was a busy half-
hour packing up, giving directions, etc.— and the
attention paid to my namesake was extraordinary.
Everyone seemed anxious to claim him for his own
now, and those who had not had the honour of his
acquaintance desired eagerly to make it At last the
select party of Sir William’s amis were stowed away
in the Port Captain’s barge and two launches, and as
we descended the sides the crews tossed their oars
and the officers stood up in the drenching rain and
saluted the friends of his Majesty. On shore some
functionaries in uniform and an army of porters; a
crowd in the waiting-room to look at the Emperor’s
friend. Lord Russell, Governor-General of the Indias,
who was coming back to be Prime Minister. For a
moment I enjoyed the honour and pleasure of passing
for that illustrious unknown, and one gentleman, who
said he had a brother in Pondicherry, requested to
have the honour of shaking hands with me. We were
treated to ‘ Vive I’Empereur I ' and ‘ Vive I’Angleterre ! ’
as the train moved off. Our special had many delays
— the line was not cleared, and we had to wait at
Lyons for the ordinary train — but, after all, we were
out of quarantine and on our way to England I ”

A few days after his return to London, Russell went
to the India House to call on Lord Stanley, who had
written to ask him to do so. He judged that Lord
Stanley was more concerned with the civil and political
than with the military problems of India, but he could
tell him little about the former except in the case of
Oudh. He expressed a plain opinion, however, that
Great Britain had taken quite as much of India as she

R, — VOL. I. . ^ ® ®

370

LEADER-WRITING [Chap. XXIX.

could hold, and further that the annexation of Oudh
had very much to do with the rising of the people as
distinguished from the rising of the Sepoys. Lord
Stanley said that the support given to Lord Canning’s
policy of clemency by the letters in the Times had been
of essential service.

When Russell returned home that day he found a
letter from Delane, asking whether he could be
depended on in case of need to accompany the French
Army in Italy. He decided to think the matter over.
The next week he dined with Lord Stanley, met a
large party of India Board officials, and had the curious
sensation of being informed by comparative strangers
that he was going to represent the Times at the
Emperor’s headquarters. At home that night he found,
to his dismay, that some gossip had already blurted
out to Mrs. Russell, “So your husband is off to the
wars again!” “There were tears,” Russell writes,
briefly and sadly.

To Mrs. Russell, whose health had suffered intensely
from a long illness, the frequent partings had indeed
become intolerable ; her affectionate nature expressed
itself in torments of apprehension. Russell was able
to swear that he had not made any engagement.
Peace was restored, but not confidence, for Delane,
meeting Russell and his wife a day or two later in the
Park, teased Mrs. Russell about her dread of another
campaign. “Why, he thrives on them ! ” and so on.

Delane pursued the matter like the resolute editor
be was. Soon a letter came from him : —

“You must have seen that Captain _ ,* though

possibly a very good artillerist, cannot wield that much

* An officer who was acting as Times coixespondent with the
French.

VILLA FRANCA

371

1859]

more difficult weapon — the pen. In fact, he brings
discredit on us, on the craft you have made illustrious,
and in some measure upon you ; for nothing will
persuade the public that you are here in London while
good blows are being struck only four days off. Just
consider whether the public are not more right in this
appreciation of you than you are in remaining at home,
and whether Lombardy would not suit you as well as
Switzerland. Besides, a summer in Lombardy would
solve the whole difficulty of your house ! ”

The mention' of Switzerland was in reference to
Russell’s determination to go there for some quiet
writing. He had by this time undertaken to prepare
his diaries in India for Messrs. Routledge, and he
wanted to find some place where he could stay with
his family and work without interruption. London
had been found hopeless; Folkestone little better;
therefore he decided to go to Switzerland. He started
in due course with his family and, after a short stay
in Paris, travelled on to Berne. On the way they
rested at Basle, and at “ Les Trois Rois ” Russell met
Mr. John Bigelow, and began there a friendship which

lasted for the rest of his life.

When he began to work at Berne on his diaries —
these, of course, are the diaries of which use has been
made in describing the Mutiny— Russell was still in
doubt whether he would be required to take the field
with the French Army. On July 8th his landlord
rushed in upon him at breakfast with a copy of the
Beme Gazette announcing that pourparlers had been
arranged between the French and the Austrians, and
that peace would very likely be the result The
Treaty of Villa Franca was signed three days later.
On July 13th Delane wrote to Russell: —

“ I was very glad to get your pleasant letter and
to find that you are really in Berne and hard at

372

LEADER-WRITING [Chap. XXIX.

work. Never fear that it won’t run glib off your pen
as soon as you really go at it. As to the war, you will
have heard before this of its most lame and impotent
conclusion. All our own old bunglers, from those of
Cintra downwards — even they never made such bad
terms, never sold blood and treasure so cheap, as
L. N. 1 1 ! My only doubt is, whether he has not got
out of Austria some secret concession on some point
touching him more nearly than the liberties of Italy —
whether he has not got a promise of the Rhine, of
Belgium, or of some such price to be paid by others.”

Russell did not get the Indian diaries finished so
quickly as he had hoped. Few men were more
dependent than he on continual intercourse with
intelligent men. “I am not in force,” he writes.
Again, “ I feel the want of society. I am in a desert.”

In August he received the following letter from
Delane : —

“ A ugust gth, 1 8s 9.

“ My Dear Russell, — It has occurred to me that if
you would take the trouble you could write just as
good leading articles as anyone else, and that if you
could do so, we could give you well-paid and con-
tinuous employment, not dependent on such happy
accidents as Indian Mutinies and foreign wars, but
such as could be an effectual stand-by for all the time
for which you or I have any concern. At the same
time there is certainly this peculiarity in the writing
of leading articles — that many men who succeed in
other branches of composition fail in this, and it may
happen that you may be another example of this rule.
I don’t at all expect it, and besides that, you may
entirely rely upon whatever assistance I can give you.
The experiment is at least well worth trying. I would
suggest then, that as we have a dull time coming on
and everybody is anxious to get away, the next six
months will afford the best opportunity for a trial.
There is likely, too, to be a fair supply of ‘off’ subjects
which it is always most easy to treat, and also I shall
be here and alone and anxious, if for no better reason.

DELANE’S RULE

373

1859]

to make my own plan succeed. If you like my pro-
posal, then try to polish off your book as soon as you
can and let us get the scheme into gear as soon as
possible.

“ Ever yours,

“J. T. D.”

On arriving in London in September, Russell went
to stay for a few days with a soldier friend at Wool-
wich, but was put into harness at once as a leader-
writer. The night of his arrival he dined with Delane,
and the next day received one of the notes, with the
form of which he was so familiar, directing his atten-
tion to Italian affairs and requesting him to attend to
the subject that evening. Delane made it an almost
invariable rule to write the directions for his staff
before he walked from Printing House Square at two
or three in the morning to his house at Serjeants’ Inn.
He might have told Russell at dinner what his views
were, but he adhered to his custom of writing — there
could be no mistake in a written instruction; there
might easily be misapprehension over a bottle of
claret.

A fragment of Russell’s autobiography describes his
first attempts at leader-writing : —

“I had no experience in leader-writing for the
Times, much as 1 had written for the Press, and I
knew that very brilliant and able men were quite
unable to satisfy the requirements of Printing House
Square, whilst others, not wholly bright and gifted
otherwise, had the gift in perfection. I entered the
little room which was to be the scene of my struggle
with the printer’s devil in no very confident spi^,
though I had dined pleasantly at mess at Woolwich
and was cheerful enough till my eye rested on a
formidable heap of cuttings and print neatly piled on
the writing-table. I must explain as to the struggle I
have mentioned, that when the theme suited me and

374

LEADER-WRITING [Chap. XXIX

my pen moved swiftly over the slips, I could generally
accomplish my task by 12.30 or i o’clock ; but some-
times the editor was impatient and the grey matter
would not work, and the blurred sheets chided each
dull delay of revision or correction enforced by the
imp from the printing slab, with ‘ The editor is sending
every moment for your copy, sir ! ’ Sometimes the
ready finger would be waiting to seize the top of the
page as the pen reached the bottom. I finished my
first leader at two o’clock, revised the proof and was
about to leave when the messenger said, ' Mr. Delane
would like to see you before you go, sir.’ And it was
nearly three before I was called into his room, where
he was glowering across the table at a monk(^-faced
little man, to hear ‘ Capital 1 Well done I Come a
little earlier on Sunday ! ’ I turned out in evening
clothes and a light overcoat at 3.15 in Ludgate Hill,
and, as my baggage was at Woolwich, I slept at the
London Bridge Hotel and went down to barracks by
the first train next morning. When I entered the
ante-room for breakfast and saw the Times laid out on
the table, I experienced a curious feeling of mauvaise
honte, mingled with curiosity, but it was soon dispelled
by the satisfaction which the appearance of the leader
in a prominent place caused me. I read it very care-
fully, and detected in the garish light of day faults
invisible at 2 a.m., but on the whole I was rather proud
of my work and rather disappointed no one talked
about the Times' views of the Italian question at mess
or at the club when I went up to town. Next day I
had to repair to my workshop in Printing House
Square and interest myself in the news just in from
China and India. 'I congratulate you. Your article
has the real stuff and go of a leader, and you shall see
it in the first place to-morrow.’ This from Delane.

“For some time, studio fallente laborem, I was
delighted with and proud of my work. There was a
canon, not expressedT but understood, that the Times
leader-writers were to keep their incognito. I have
often had the pleasure of hearing my friends discuss
my handiwork, sometimes the pain of listening to very
stringent criticism. On one occasion coming up in
the train from Ascot with a number of natives, I was

THACKERAY

37S

1859]

amused by the contemptuous way in which one of
them in reply to a remark of mine said, T would advise
you to read to-day’s Times (that is, my own article)
before you take that view of the subject’ Incidents
like that were not infrequent More than once my
ears tingled, my cheeks reddened, as I listened perforce
in silence to some smart invective, and was made
aware of some serious blunder or some fallacy of
reasoning, for people were beginning to assert the
right of private judgment and to examine the quality
of the bolts of the 7 hunderer. Thackeray was one of
the few who knew my secret, and as he strolled round
from his house in Onslow Square, with his cigar, to
Sumner Place* after breakfast I was anxious for his
opinion, and I knew when he said ‘ I have not read my
7 imes very carefully this morning ’ that he was not
quite content with me. He could always guess what
was mine. He was, I think, averse to my course of
life. ‘ Don’t wrap yourself up in Times foolscap. You
have escaped now. Try work for yourself!’ But
alas 1 There were the various little reasons at home,
and the twelve hundred reasons a year on the other
side of the question.

“ One day some years afterwards I went to the office
with Thackeray and others to look at a new printing
machine ; the old one was at work, whirling round and
round, and throwing off the long riband of printed
paper with the satisfied hum of wheel and fly, and the
buzz of life within its iron rollers peculiar to well-
organised machinery. Thackeray, with his hand in his
breeches pockets, his glasses on his nose, stood before
it for a moment, then putting his right hand forth
with menacing finger toward the press he exclaimed,

‘ Heartless ! insatiable I bloody ! clestroying monster 1
What brains you have ground to pulp ! What hopes
you have crushed, what anxiety you have inflicted on
us all!’

“ And, indeed, the work became after a while ‘work’ ;
there was a great difference between the absolute
freedom of my life in the field, and the dictation from
the office. But that was but a small matter compared
with the thorns in my path which grew up as I

* Russell at this time lived at 18, Sumner Place, S.W.

376

LEADER-WRITING [Chap. XXIX

advanced. On some questions I was incompetent to
write, and then I had to read attacks on the Times for
what I knew and felt to be my own mistakes. Then,
a^ain, I had to suffer from slashing excisions or
pitiless mutilations. Once I read a leader which was
word for word as I had sent it into the editor’s room till
midway, when another hand was set to work, and I saw :
‘ So far we have presented to our readers all that can
fairly be urged in favour of something or other, and
having done so we will now proceed to test the value
of the arguments.’ And then came an elaborate refuta-
tion of my text, caused, I believe, by a visit to the
Editor at the office of an eminent statesman during a
debate in the House. I was still busy, too, on my
diaries in India, which Messrs. Routledge were urged
to publish ere the interest of the events of 1857 — 8 had
quite died out, and the leader-writing, and late hours,
took it out of me. But the office was, nevertheless,
very pleasant, and Delane delighted to gather his
people about him at cosy little dinners at Serjeants’
Inn as often as he could. ”

About this time Russell received a letter from Lord
Clyde in India He had written to ask for information
about the revolt of European troops which had taken
place after his own departure.

“ Simla,

“5oik August, 1859.

“ My Dear Sir, — I am obliged to employ a scribe to
write for me. The influenza has been hanging about
me for some weeks, and has gone to my eyes. The
doctor has, in consequence, desired me not to use them.
I have received your note of 7th June. Before we
left India the first symptoms of discontent amongst the
local European troops had already become manifest.
The Crown lawyers at Calcutta, looking at the legal
and not at the moral footing of the affair, decided that
an Act of Parliament was a law which must be obeyed,
and I suppose they would have advised coercion.
However, Lord Canning determined to refer the
question home. All that could be done meanwhile
was to persuade the men to remain quiet at their duty

THE WHITE MUTINY

377

1859]

until a reply from England could be received. The
reply decided curtly that their claims of discharge
or re-enlistment with a bounty were ‘ inadmissible.’
This decision was read to the men at Meerut about the
30th April, and they immediately held meetings and
refused to do duty. I considered that I had better
proceed at once to Meerut, and had gone as far as
[word illegible] when I met Lyel Johnston, Adjt of
the Bengal Artillery, who had come up for the purpose
of seeing me. He assured me that the men were past
speaking to. It was evidently probable that all the
other local troops in India would make common cause
on this point, and it was impossible to foresee how far
the Queen’s troops might feel with them. It became
necessary to take up a line of conduct. A collision
seemed to be a frightful contingency, under the eye of
the native chiefs, who would, of course, have been
delighted at our internal divisions. A collision was
called a disaster in a letter I had from Sir Robert
Montgomery, so I thought it best to temporise by
ordering the men to return to their duty, on their
doing which a Court of Inquiry would be held to hear
their complaints. As this went on intercepted letters
were taken which showed decided combination, and
the worst sentiment towards Government, and there
was strong reason to believe that the 88th was
disposed to sympathise, or even join the mutineers
All the local Army showed, some more overtly than
others, that the majority of the men wished for
discharge, or bounty, or re-enlistment. _ What is
curious, and a fatal condemnation of the discipline of
the Company’s local Army, is that in no instance did
a^ old soldier or N.C. officers give notice to their
officers of what was brewing, of which they roust
have been aware. This was a dreadful state of things
for the Indian Government The G.G. too late dis-
covered that it was not a question brought forward
by a few litigious men, but that it was a bona fide revolt
of the whole local white army with a view to obtain
discharge, or bounty, or re-enlistment at their option.
Coercion was out of the question, and at_ last Lord
Canning made his compromise, granting discharge to
all who wished for it, but refusing bounty or permission

378 LEADER-WRITING [Chap. XXIX.

to re-enlist* to anyone. This was not what the men,
as a body, wished for or expected ; and I have little
doubt that many more took their discharge than had
originally intended to do so, urged by a desire to spite
the Government, possibly with the idea that the
expense of sending home so many thousand men
might frighten the G.G. into compliance with their
demands.

“The Line has been called on for Volunteers to fill
up the gap in the local European Artillery, and there
has been no difficulty in procuring plenty of chosen
Volunteers. I have proposed that if the Government
intend to retain a local Army, the regiments should
be periodically relieved by others from Europe, bring-
ing with them good English blood and discipline. I
hope to have the pleasure of seeing you in the spring,
and remain, “Yours very faithfully,

“ Clyde.”

Another friend connected with India from whom
Russell received a letter was Kavanagh. Kavanagh
had come to Ireland. He complained in his letter that
he had applied in vain at the India House to be
compensated immediately for the wounds he had
suffered in the Mutiny, and he continued : —

“ Since I shall stay so long in Ireland, I should be
happy, indeed, to get the notes of introduction to your
friends which you have so very kindly offered. I have
made a few friends only, because it is only this month
that we have been able to go out. My wife reached
England last August in very bad health, and I could not
leave her much; and you know how slowly a man makes
friends after an absence of nearly thirty years from
his country, with no one on his return who knows him.
My reception in Ireland was very different from what
I had expected. _ That amiable old English gentleman
Lord Carlisle is the only person of note who has
shown me the least civility, though I have lately made
three or four friends who are very kind.”

* Many of the men who obtained their discharge as a result of the
White Mutiny ” re-enlisted afterwards in England.

CHAPTER XXX

THE ARMY AND NAVY GAZETTE

In December, 1859, Russell was drawn into an
enterprise which was destined to concern him closely,
and on the whole advantageously, for the rest of his
life. In his autobiography he writes

“Towards the close of this year the project was
conceived by some friends of mine, foremost among
whom was J. C. Deane,* of starting a weekly news-
paper, as the Volunteer movement was assuming
considerable proportions, to serve as its special organ
and at the same time to treat naval and military topics
and intelligence in connection with the general defence
of the Empire. Bradbury and Evans, the proprietors
of Punch, who had also launched the Daily News, were
keen about it if I would consent to act as editor of the
paper. But although I had broached the idea at a
dinner in Sumner Place, and Delane much approved
of it, I was not quite sure that I could undertake the
task. I had written a pamphlet at the beginning of
the Volunteer propaganda in which I had argued
strongly against the tendency of the Volunteers to
form shooting clubs, and insisted on the usefulness
and advantage of cores organisation, but I did not see
any prospect of the Volunteers needing and supporting
a paper specially devoted to their interests. 1 looked
into the question, studied the Service papers then in
existence, and gradually came to the conclusion that
if a naval and military journal with sufficient claims

* John Connellan Deane was the eldest son of Sir Thomas Deane,
who belonged to a well-known family in County Cork. Russell, in
his diary, says of “ He was a fellow of infinite jest and huniour,

with a lovely voice, great social qualities, infinite suggestion, kindlj^
great at exhibitions. He started the Manchester Exhibition, and
was enthusiastic about the Crystal Palace. ^ A great favormte ^of
Thackeray’s at the Garrick. He lived (and died} mostly in Italy.

380

A. & J\/. G.

[Chap. XXX.

to the support of the Services were started, there
would be a tair field for the association of the Volunteers
with them in an advocacy of their objects. There were
many dinners over the elaboration of the scheme —
these principally at a haunt of Thackeray’s and of
Evans, senior, and of various ancient benchers, to
wit, the Gray’s Inn Coffee House, where there was
generous 20 port and where the ' simple food of the
sagacious Sybarite,’ as Cuddy Ellison called it, or of
‘ the four S dinner ’ (a basin of turtle Soup, a cutlet
of Salmon, a Steak, a Snipe, and marrow bones), was
to be had in perfection — and at last it assumed shape
and took even a name : Tke Army and Na'ty Gazette,
and Journal of the Militia Volunteers. When the
scheme was sufficiently advanced so that I could treat
its execution as a probability, Bradbury and Evans
had asked me the question, and I put it straight to
my friend. Delane’s answer was : ‘There is not the
smallest reason to fear opposition from us — quite the
contrary.’ The prospectus was written, it was printed,
and Bradbury and Evans were sending it to all quarters
of the globe. I had written to my friends, naval and
military, and agencies had been established at home
and abroad, and I had secured the help as assistant
editor of my friend, Mr. J. C. O’Dowd,* then on the
staff of the Globe, when a bolt fell from a clear sky
whence I least looked for it”

The bolt was a letter from Delane : —

“Serjeants’ Inn,

“ December 20th.

“My Dear Russell, — You will be sorry to hear
that objection is taken to your connection with the
Army and Nam Gazette on the not unreasonable
ground that while you receive a salary from us you
ought not to conduct any other paper. I confess I
think the objection is a good one, and it was only
under the erroneous impression that you were now
on the footing of a contributor instead of that of a

* Afterwards Sir James Cornelius O’Dowd, Deputy-Judge Advo-
cate-General, Like Russell, he had been educated at Trinity
College, Dublin, and had a reputation as a wit.

A BOLT

381

1859!

regular member of our staff that I so readily gave my
consent to your proposal. What then will you do ?
Will you abandon the Gazette or resume the character
of a contributor? Perhaps it would be as well to
address Morris on the subject, but in either event you
may rely on any help that can be given

“ By yours ever faithfulty,

“J. T. Delane.”

Russell slept on it, and next day wrote : —

“ My Dear Delane, — Your letter has placed me in
a most painful position, and as you have ever been a
great and true friend to me there is no one whose
advice I would so readily seek as yours if you can
give it to me now. It never entered into my head for
a moment that you could be unacquainted with the
nature of my relations to the Times, when I asked
your permission to connect myself with the forth-
coming paper. It is not for me to question the
soundness of the grounds on which that permission
has been revoked, and I can now only ask for time
that I may consider what course I shall take, for I am
bound to Bradbury and Evans, and I have entered
into engagements with Mr. O’Dowd and others which
must be dealt with without any breach of faith on my
part. I will write to Morris at once and state the case
to him. I need not say that my feeling inclines me to
fight under the old flag under which I have served for
so many years of my life. You ask me whether I will
give up the A. &" iv. G. or assume the character of a
contributor. Is there not a mistake in the way of
putting the alternatives, inasmuch as being now, as
you say, a member of the regular staff of the paper, if
I abandon the Gazette I retain my present position
without any change ?

“ Ever yours, my dear Delane, most sincerely,

“W. H. Russell.”

In his perplexity Russell wrote to his old friend,
John MacDonald, who answered:—

“ My Dear W. H. R., — Delane’s permission, given
and acted on without consulting Morris, has certainly
placed you in an awkward predicament with Bradbury

382

A. & N. G.

[Chap. XXX.

and Evans, but they must have been aware that your
engagement with them was at any moment liable to
be broken off if found incompatible with your Times
connexion. This is exactly what has happened, but
a little sooner than could be expected, and though the
circumstance is annoying, I don’t know that it is in
all respects to be regretted. Knowing the strict rule
of the office in such matters, I confess to some surprise
at hearing that it was departed from in your case, and
when Morris on Monday morning broached the subject
I saw at once what the result would be. You will be
shocked to hear that I felt myself obliged to coincide
with Morris in the matter when he asked me for my
opinion, and that my deliberate conviction, as your
friend, is against your forming any connexion with
any other periodical in which you may seem to barter
to others the reputation which you have won upon
the Times. Stick to that and to book-writing, or to
anything, but other papers, whereby you can make
an income. On no consideration consent again to
abandon your firm position as a salaried servant of
P. H. S. until you have got something so good as to
make that position unimportant. You can have no
idea how uneasy it made me when you gave up your
situation to lecture, and how I rdoiced when you were
once more back amongst us. I am interrupted and
can’t write more now ; but come and talk to me to-
morrow, and believe me, my dear fellow,

" Always yours,

“John C MacDonald.”

Russell continues in his autobiography : —

“There was correspondence and there were conver-
sations, and I went one day from Serjeants’ Inn with
Delane to Morris at Printing House Square, who was
with J. Walter, Dasent and MacDonald. Morris came
down after a few minutes, evidently with an ultimatum.

‘ It was a settled rule at the office that no member of the
staff could be permitted to draw money from another
paper,’ etc. With Delane by my side I could not
fight my battle on the ground that I had received
express permission from my chief. It was a sine qua
non that if I wrote for another paper I must give up

A SETTLEMENT

383

i860]

the Times. My allusion to an expression in one of
Morris’s letters, however, produced an impression,
and after an interview of two hours the high con-
tracting parties signed a treaty. I was to cease to be
a salaried member of the staff, but I was to be put on
the list of contributors of the first class. Delajie was
to give me as much work as I could do, and whenever
I gave up the Army and Navy Gazette I was to revert
to my old position on the Times as if I had never left."

The Army and Navy Gazette office was already
painted, and was to be ready in a week. It was the
old office of Dickens’s Household Words. There was
certainly a place for a military paper on new lines.
The Army had come through the two important
campaigns of the Crimea and the Indian Mutiny
in quick succession ; in the Crimea a deplorable lack
of method and system had been redeemed only by
the fortitude and bravery of the officers and men ;
and the unexpected ordeal in India had been protracted
into the campaigns which were the inevitable conse-
quence of the Mutiny proper; moreover, these cam-
paigns and the transference of the government of
India from the Company to the Crown had led to
a reorganisation of the Indian Army. The Volunteer
movement, too, had begun and had prospered under
the menace of invasion.

Russell had not entered upon the enterprise without
consulting some of the most important of his soldier
friends. Sir De Lacy Evans wrote : —

“ I have, I assure you, been much gratified by
hearing that you have undertaken the guidance of a
naval and military gazette. For the armed professions
I think it a subject of sincere congratulation. At any
time, but above all at the present time, a very ably-
conducted periodical, intimately connected with and
contributive as I expect this will be, to the defences of
the country, is a national desideratum.

384

A. & N. G.

[Chap. XXX.

“ You will bring to your task most unusual qualifi-
cations. Few, if any, have seen so much of the last
two wars England has been engaged in. Not as an
amateur — not as a subaltern actor, with some par-
ticular corps or arm — but truly in the most extensive
sense of the terms, as an impartial, independent,
critical observer and historian of the great operations
of these momentous conflicts.”

Sir John Burgoyne, Sir Martin Dillon, and many
other well-known soldiers were among the first con-
tributors. Russell, indeed, gathered about him a staff
which for its particular purpose might fairly be called
brilliant. A hurried entry in his diary gives the
feverish experience of the evening before the paper
was published for the first time : —

“January 6th, i860. Went down to printing office
and drank sherries with J. C. Deane, O’Dowd, and
Bradbury and Evans to our new paper. Gave printer
£2 as pourboire. To Evans’s. Then returned to office,
where I lay down about 3 o’clock a.m. and went to bed
on the sofa.”

In the first number Russell wrote of the relations of
the Press to the Services, arguing that it was inevit-
able that these should have been rather illicit. But
the case of India was exceptional, for there the Press
was more under control, and men like Mansfield and
Edwardes “gained reputations with their pens ere
they won it by the sword.” But it was coming to be
understood that the problem of the British Army and
Navy was of vital public importance and therefore of
vital public interest. “ In all honour we aspire to be
the organ of the Services, so far as they can have an
organ at all ” — an aspiration which the Army and Navy
Gazette most creditably cultivates to this day.

For months Russell worked hard at the new paper.

i86o]

FINANCE

38s

thinking of little else. “ Working like several niggers ”
he writes in his diary one day, and entries in the same
sense are numerous. Yet he used to burn his candle
at both ends, dining out nearly every night, haunting
the Garrick, keeping late hours, often sleeping at the
Army and Navy Gazette oflSce. Thackeray good-
naturedly used to go out of his way to read the paper
and offer advice.

In May, Thackeray made Russell an offer to write
for the Comhill, and the sequel follows pat in the
diary “ We dined at Greenwich thereupon.” It was
necessary, in fact, for Russell to make more money
than the Army and Navy Gazette brought him. The
faculty of economy, as we know, was not his. He
seems to have hired a brougham regularly for his
family and also to have kept a horse for riding in
Rotten Row. The terms he could command for his
work at this time are approximately stated in the
record 6f a conversation with J. C. Deane.

“ I dined on business matters with Deane, who had
full powers to treat for Bradbury and Evans. He
offered £25 a week as retaining fee for editing the
Army and Navy Gazette, but I would have nothing to
do with that, and I proposed : i. That ^ salary as
editor should be i s guineas a week. 2. That in June
I begin to write a book for Bradbury and Evans, to be
finished in October, for which I am to receive £i,2<Xi
and division of profits. 3. That in October I am going
to America to describe the Presidential election, all
expenses being paid by Bradbury and Evans, and that
I am, if possible before Parliament meets, to brir^ put
a book, tor which I am to get ;^i,2oo and half profits.
4. That if I am sent abroad by the Times I continue
my connexion with the Army and Navy Gazette if the
Times permits it, and that I give preference to Bradbury
and Evans of any work I may write connected with my
expedition.”

R.— VOL. 1.

c c

386

A. & N. G.

[Chap. XXX.

In October another child was born to Russell, and
his wife began to suffer from a more intense illness
from which she never recovered. At any time of the
day when he could shake himself free from his work,
he would go home to Sumner Place to try if he
could distract her thoughts or alleviate her pain ; and
there are touching entries in the diaries which suggest
briefly, but completely, the unwavering friendship of
Thackeray. Thackeray used often to walk through
Sumner Place at appointed times, and Russell would
appear at the window and if he felt unable to leave his
wife would wave Thackeray away, or, in the contrary
case, would signal that he was coming down for a
walk.

Such work as Russell found time to do apart from
the Army and Navy Gazette was chiefly reviewing of
books for the Times. A letter of instruction on the
subject gives a glimpse of Delane’s conception of how
such work should be done : —

“ I don’t think," he wrote upon receiving a particular
review from Russell, “ you have given yourself any-
thing like time to write this last article. It is full of
small points of detail but contains no such general
summing up of the book as the public will naturally
expect. Pray look it all over again and let me have a
separate ‘ But to conclude.”’

Delane had no notion that it was right for a
reviewer to be clever rather than to be informing and
clear. He could not tolerate that a writer should
gratify his ambitions at the expense of his reader ; to
produce the most brilliant criticism which left the
reader in some doubt as to the contents of the book
was, to his mind, simply perverse ; the review must
state clearly the matter and manner of the book. The
reader should be enabled to say, “ Now I know what

A “WIGGING

387

i860]

that book contains and how it is written,” rather than
“ Whoever wrote that review is an uncommonly clever
fellow.” The charge against Russell, of course, was
not one of egotism or perversity but of carelessness.
But Delane seldom wrote to him about reviewing
without reasserting his general principles on the
subject. -

Another interesting glimpse of Delane is given by a
letter in which he administered to Russell what the
latter describes, without mitigation, in his diary as a
“ wigging ”

December 2Uh, i860.

“ Dear Russell, — I hope I am as placable as most
people, but I confess to very considerable annoyance
at your conduct to-day, for a trifle may annoy one as
much as an injury. You first said you could not come
to dinner and I wrote to ask Cooke ; then came your
second note saying you could come and I recalled the
letter to Cooke. 1 wished to ask Loch, just fresh from
China, but for your sake would not exceed my stipu-
lated number of eight. We waited for you until eight
o’clock, and I need not say you did not come. Of
course it is of no consequence ; nobody is the worse ;
we shall none of us die of it ; but life is made up of
trifles, and I had promised to two of the party, who
will probably have no other opportunity, the gratifica-
tion of meeting you. Could you not have sent a note
if either business or pleasure detained you ? It would
only have been a reasonable courtesy to so old a friend
as yours faithfully,

“John T. Delane.”

As it happened, Russell had a tolerable excuse in the
illness of his wife, which that evening had driven all
other matters out of his head.

By the middle of February, 1861, a definite proposal
had been made by Delane that Russell should go to
America as special correspondent of the Times. The
matter of course had to be discussed with Bradbury

A. & N. G.

388

[Chap. XXX.

and Evans, and after an interview Russell wrote in his
diary ; —

“ Evans was very angry at hearing the proposal to
leave the Army and JNavy Gazette on account of the
Times, but cooled down. It would never do for me to
refuse the great opportunity afforded by the Times,
and in reality my absence from the Army and Navy
Gazette will do it no harm at all.”

Very soon the difficulty was settled. Thackeray
agreed with Russell that it would be fatal to refuse the
offer of the Times. “ You must go,” he said ; “ besides,
it is an opportunity."

Russell quailed before the prospect of leaving his
wife, but at length he made a clean breast of his
engagement, and to some extent was able to mollify
her fears by Delane’s suggestion that he was to return
from the United States if he found himself in any
danger.

“ If you have the smallest reason to suppose that
you will be exposed to any outrage or annoyance,”
Delane had said, “ let nothing induce you to remain.
Come back at once. Do not hesitate. I will take care
that you are held secure, and that you shall not suffer,
and you may depend upon it your interests will be
protected here. We have quite enough risks on our
hands already, without any such addition as your
danger wouldf make.”

Russell took a berth in a steamer due to leave
England on March ist. He wound up the last day of
February at the Garrick, where Thackeray made a
little speech in his honour over a bowl of punch. The
next morning he parted from his wife and was able to
write in his diary : —

“ She bore up most nobly. Never can I forget her
look in CTeat sorrow, the fretting face and the melting
lips. What a good, brave, Irish heart and true soul!^’

OFF TO AMERICA

389

1861]

In the evening he was once more on the high seas,
bound for the seat of war. But in what a different
case from when he started for Malta before the Crimean
W^ar ! Now he was a man whom his countrymen
hastened to honour, a man of established authority,
with the eyes of the world, and particularly of his
fellow-passengers, upon him. He was, moreover, an
editor.

APPENDIX TO VOLUME I

^hs Thin Red Line. — It is worth while to insist upon the
authorship and the just employment of this phrase, as doubts
have been expressed on both points. It must be admitted
that the phrase has suffered some changes under Russell’s
own pen. The words as they are quoted in the body of this
book are taken from “The British Expedition to the Crimea,”
1877 edition. In Notes and Queries of January 19th, 1895,
Captain C. S. Harris wrote: —

“ (8th S. VI., 379.) — I notice that in the review of the
Nineteenth Century, at the above reference, it is remarked : ‘ In
an article in support of the Nonconformist conscience, the
Rev. T. G. Rogers alludes to the “thin red line ” of Balaclava.
This is new to us. It was not of Balaclava that the phrase
was used.’ I have not the means of reference at hand, but
I have always understood that the old 93rd Highlanders were
described by Dr. W. H. Russell as ‘ that thin red line ’ in
his Times correspondence when they stood in line to receive
the charge of the Russian cavalry at Balaclava, not taking
the trouble to form square, and that it was for this action
they were granted the right to add ‘ Balaclava ’ to the other
battle honours on their colours, they being the only infantry
regiment to which this right was granted. I knew the regi-
ment well for a considerable period, and always understood
that the above was the case, and their regimental magazine
is now published by the name of The Thin Red Line; but
perhaps some correspondents could refer to the original source,
and so place the matter beyond question.”

Captain Harris then wrote to Russell, who answered as
follows

“Your letter of the 31st has just reached me, and in reply
to your first question as to the ‘thin red line,’ I believe that
I may claim the authorship or parentage. I have refeired to
page 227 of the only copy of the work you mention in my
possession, marked on the title-page ‘21st Thousand,’ and
find that you have quoted the words correctly from the text;

392

APPENDIX lU vui^UMJc. 1

but I wrote ‘tipped,’ not ‘topped,’ and in a subsequent
correction of the ‘ Letters,’ entitled ‘The British Expedition
to the Crimea,’ published by Routledge in 1877, the words
are (p. 156) ^tJiin red line tij^ped with steeV How they
happened to be printed in italics I cannot say, but I certainly
did not intend them for a quotation. The 93rd were the thin
red line I spoke of at Balaclava.”

Other letters in Notes and Queries explain the matter further.
Thus Captain C, S. Harris wrote : —

February gthy 1895.

“‘Thin Red Line’ (8th S. VI., 379; VII., 57). — Since
writing my reply on the subject I have quite unexpectedly
met with a copy of Dr. W. H, Russell’s ‘ Letters to the Times
from the Crimea* (Messrs. Routledge, London, 1855), and
on turning to the one dated October 25th, 1854, I find the
following description of the charge of the Russian cavalry on
the 93rd Highlanders, which occurred shortly before the
charge of our own heavy and light cavalry brigades on the
same day : — ‘ The heavy brigade in advance is drawn up in
two lines. The first line consists of the Scots Greys and of
their old companions in glory, the Enniskillens ; the second
of the 4th Royal Irish, of the 5th Dragoon Guards, and of the
ist Royal Dragoons. The light cavalry brigade is on their
left in two lines also. The silence is oppressive; between
the cannon bursts one can hear the chanaping of bits and the
clink of sabres in the valley below. The Russians on their
left drew breath for a moment, and then in one grand line
dashed at the Highlanders. The ground flies beneath their
horses* feet ; gathering speed at every stride, they dash on
towards that thin red streak topped with a line of steel. The
Turks fire a volley at eight hundred yards, down goes that
line of steel in front, and out rings a rolling volley of Minie
musketry. The distance is too great : the Russians are not
checked, but still sweep onwards through the smoke, with
the whole force of horse and man, here and there knocked
over by the shot of our batteries above. With breathless
suspense everyone awaits the bursting of the wave upon the
line of Gaelic rock ; but ere they come within a hundred and
fifty yards, another deadly volley flashes from the levelled
rifles, and carries death and terror into the Russians. They
wheel about, open files right and left, and fly back faster than
they came. Bravo, Highlanders!^ well done! shout the
excited ^ spectators : but events thicken. The Highlanders
and their splendid front are soon forgotten ; men scarcely have
a moment to think of this fact, that the 93rd never altered

APPENDIX TO VOLUME I

393

their formation to receive that tide of horsemen. “No/\said
Sir Colin Campbell, “ I did not think it worth while to form
them even four-deep ! ” The ordinary British line, two-deep,
was quite sufficient to repel the attack of these Muscovite
cavaliers.’ ”

Meanwhile a Mr. Hems had written from Exeter : —

“ Was not this expression used in reference to our troops
at the Alma ? And in Napier’s History of the Peninsular
War, if I am not very much mistaken, it also occurs.”

Yet another letter was this : —

Incredible though it may seem, I really think that for
once Dr. J. G. Rogers was wrong, and that the reviewer was
right. Surely this picturesque, but mathematically absurd,
sight was witnessed at the battle of the Alma, where Kinglake
wrote about * the scarlet arch of the knoll.* **

“Edward H. Marshall, M.A.”

Russell himself tipped this curious exchange of opinions
with steel by sending the following observations : —

“ ‘Thin Red Line’ (8th S. VI., 379; 57, ii5),-~Mr. Hems
asks, * Was not this expression used in reference to our troops
at the Alma ? ’ I do not think it was. If it were, the words
would have been most inaccurate. If Mr. Hems finds the
phrases in Napier’s ‘ History,’ I will eat the volume. Mr,
E. H. Marshall, however, thinks apparently that what he
calls the picturesque, but mathematic^ly absurd, sight of the
‘thin red line' at Balaclava was seen at the Alma in ‘the
scarlet arch on the knoll.’ After that there is no saying
where the absurd sight, mathematical or picturesque, may
not be looked for.